of  Ccttcrs 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON 


BY 

LESLIE  STEPHEN 


NEW    YORK 

•   HARP  Eli    &    BROTHERS,    PUBLISHERS 

FRANKLIN      SQUARE 

1878 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

FACE 

CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE 1 


CHAPTER  II. 
LITERARY  CAREER 16 

CHAPTER  III. 
JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS 53 

CHAPTER  IV. 
JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR       .....        05 

CHAPTER  V. 
THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE     ....      142 

CHAPTER  VI. 
JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS 106 


SAMUEL   JOHNSON. 

CHAPTER  I. 

CHILDHOOD   AND   EARLY  LIFE. 

SAMUEL  JOHNSON  was  "born  in  Lichfield  in  1709.  His 
father,  Michael  Johnson,  was  a  "bookseller,  highly  respected 
by  the  cathedral  clergy,  and  for  a  time  sufficiently  prosperous 
to  be  a  magistrate  of  the  town,  and,  in  the  year  of  his  son's 
birth,  sheriff  of  the  county.  He  opened  a  bookstall  on 
market-days  at  neighbouring  towns,  including  Birmingham, 
which  was  as  yet  unable  to  maintain  a  separate  bookseller. 
The  tradesman  often  exaggerates  the  prejudices  of  the  class 
whose  wants  he  supplies,  and  Michael  Johnson  was  pro- 
bably a  more  devoted  High  Churchman  and  Tory  than 
many  of  the  cathedral  clergy  themselves.  He  reconciled 
himself  with  difficulty  to  taking  the  oaths  against  the 
exiled  dynasty.  He  was  a  man  of  considerable  mental 
and  physical  power,  but  tormented  by  hypochondriacal 
tendencies.  His  son  inherited  a  share  both  of  his  constitu- 
tion and  of  his  principles.  Long  afterwards  Samuel  asso- 
ciated with  his  childish  days  a  faint  but  solemn  recollection 
of  a  lady  in  diamonds  and  long  black  hood.  The  lady 
1* 


2  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

was  Queen  Anne,  to  whom,  in  compliance  with  a  super- 
stition just  dying  a  natural  death,  he  had  been  taken  by 
his  mother  to  be  touched  for  the  king's  evil.  The  touch 
was  ineffectual.  Perhaps,  as  Boswell  suggested,  he  ought  to 
have  been  presented  to  the  genuine  heirs  of  the  Stuarts  in 
Borne.  Disease  and  superstition  had  thus  stood  by  his 
cradle,  and  they  never  quitted  him  during  life.  The  de- 
mon of  hypochondria  w!is  always  lying  in  wait  for  him, 
and  could  be  exorcised  for  a  time  only  by  hard  work  or 
social  excitement.  Of  this  we  shall  hear  enough  ;  but  it 
may  be  as  well  to  sum  up  at  once  some  of  the  physical 
characteristics  which  marked  him  through  life  and  greatly 
influenced  his  career. 

The  disease  had  scarred  and  disfigured  features  other- 
wise regular  and  always  impressive.  It  had  seriously 
injured  his  eyes,  entirely  destroying,  it  seems,  the  sight  of 
one.  He  could  not,  it  is  said,  distinguish  a  friend's  face 
half  a  yard  off,  and  pictures  were  to  him  meaningless 
patches,  in  which  he  could  never  see  the  resemblance  to 
their  objects.  The  statement  is  perhaps  exaggerated ;  for 
he  could  see  enough  to  condemn  a  portrait  of  himself. 
He  expressed  some  annoyance  when  Reynolds  had  painted 
him  with  a  pen  held  close  to  his  eye ;  and  protested  that 
he  would  not  be  handed  down  to  posterity  as  "  blinking 
Sam."  It  seems  that  habits  of  minute  attention  atoned  in 
some  degree  for  this  natural  defect.  Boswell  tells  us  how 
Johnson  once  corrected  him  as  to  the  precise  shape  of  a 
mountain ;  and  Mrs.  Thrale  says  that  he  was  a  close  and 
exacting  critic  of  ladies'  dress,  even  to  the  accidental 
position  of  a  riband.  He  could  even  lay  down  assthetical 
canons  upon  such  matters.  He  reproved  her  for  wearing 
a  dark  dress  as  unsuitable  to  a  "  little  creature."  "  What," 
he  asked,  "  have  not  all  insects  gay  colours  1 "  His  insen- 


i.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EAELY  LIFE.  3 

sibility  to  music  was  even  more  pronounced  than  his  dul- 
ness  of  sight.  On  hearing  it  said,  in  praise  of  a  musical 
performance,  that  it  was  in  any  case  difficult,  his  feeling 
comment  was,  "  I  wish  it  had  been  impossible  ! " 

The  queer  convulsions  by  which  he  amazed  all  beholders 
were  probably  connected  with  his  disease,  though  he  and 
Reynolds  ascribed  them  simply  to  habit.  When  entering 
a  doorway  with  his  blind  companion,  Miss  Williams,  he 
would  suddenly  desert  her  on  the  step  in  order  to  "whirl 
and  twist  about "  in  strange  gesticulations.  The  perform- 
ance partook  of  the  nature  of  a  superstitious  ceremonial. 
Ho  would  stop  in  a  street  or  the  middle  of  a  room  to  go 
through  it  correctly.  Once  he  collected  a  laughing  mob 
in  Twickenham  meadows  by  his  antics ;  his  hands  imitat- 
ing the  motions  of  a  jockey  riding  at  full  speed  and  his  feet 
twisting  in  and  out  to  make  heels  and  toes  touch  alter- 
nately. He  presently  sat  down  and  took  out  a  Groiius 
De  Veritate,  over  which  he  "seesawed"  so  violently  that 
the  mob  ran  back  to  see  what  was  the  matter.  Once  in 
such  a  fit  he  suddenly  twisted  off  the  shoe  of  a  lady  who 
sat  by  him.  Sometimes  he  seemed  to  be  obeying  some 
hidden  impulse,  which  commanded  him  to  touch  every  post 
in  a  street  or  tread  on  the  centre  of  every  paving-stone, 
and  would  return  if  his  task  had  not  been  accurately 
performed. 

In  spite  of  such  oddities,  ho  was  not  only  possessed 
of  physical  power  corresponding  to  his  great  height  and 
massive  stature,  but  was  something  of  a  proficient  at  ath- 
letic exercises.  He  was  conversant  with  the  theory,  at 
least,  of  boxing ;  a  knowledge  probably  acquired  from  an 
uncle  who  kept  the  ring  at  Smithfield  for  a  year,  and  was 
never  beaten  in  boxing  or  Avrestling.  His  constitutional 
fearlessness  would  have  made  him  a  formidable  antagonist. 


4  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CUAI-. 

Hawkins  describes  the  oak  staff,  six  feet  in  length  and  in- 
creasing from  one  to  three  inches  in  diameter,  which  lay  ready 
to  his  hand  when  he  expected  an  attack  from  Macpherson 
of  Ossian  celebrity.  Once  he  is  said  to  have  taken  up  a 
chair  at  the  theatre  upon  which  a  man  had  seated  himself 
during  his  temporary  absence,  and  to  have  tossed  it  and 
its  occupant  bodily  into  the  pit.  He  would  swim  into 
pools  said  to  be  dangerous,  beat  huge  dogs  into  peace, 
climb  trees,  and  even  run  races  and  jump  gates.  Once  at 
least  he  went  out  foxhunting,  and  though  he  despised  the 
amusement,  was  deeply  touched  by  the  complimentary 
assertion  that  he  rode  as  well  as  the  most  illiterate  fellow 
in  England.  Perhaps  the  most  whimsical  of  his  perform- 
ances was  when,  in  his  fifty-fifth  year,  he  went  to  the  top 
of  a  high  hill  with  his  friend  Langton.  "  I  have  not  had 
a  roll  for  a  long  time,"  said  the  great  lexicographer  sud- 
denly, and,  after  deliberately  emptying  his  pockets,  he 
laid  himself  parallel  to  the  edge  of  the  hill,  and  descended, 
turning  over  and  over  till  he  came  to  the  bottom.  We 
may  believe,  as  Mrs.  Thrale  remarks  upon  his  jumping 
over  a  stool  to  show  that  he  was  not  tired  by  his  hunting, 
that  his  performances  in  this  kind  were  so  strange  and 
uncouth  that  a  fear  for  the  safety  of  his  bones  quenched 
the  spectator's  tendency  to  laugh. 

In  such  a  strange  case  was  imprisoned  one  of  the  most 
vigorous  intellects  of  the  time.  Vast  strength  hampered 
by  clumsiness  and  associated  with  grievous  disease,  deep 
and  massive  powers  of  feeling  limited  by  narrow  though 
acute  perceptions,  were  characteristic  both  of  soul  and 
body.  These  peculiarities  were  manifested  from  his  early 
infancy.  Miss  Seward,  a  typical  specimen  of  the  pro- 
vincial precieuse,  attempted  to  trace  them  in  an  epitaph 
which  he  was  said  to  have  written  at  the  age  of  three. 


I.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE.  6 

Here  lies  good  master  duck 

Whom  Samuel  Johnson  trod  on  ; 

If  it  had  lived,  it  had  been  good  luck, 
For  then  we  had  had  an  odd  one. 

The  verses,  however,  were  really  made  "by  his  father, 
who  passed  them  off  as  the  child's,  and  illustrate  nothing 
"but  the  paternal  vanity.  In  fact  the  boy  was  regarded 
as  something  of  an  infant  prodigy.  His  great  powers  of 
memory,  characteristic  of  a  mind  singularly  retentive  of 
all  impressions,  were  early  developed.  He  seemed  to  learn 
by  intuition.  Indolence,  as  in  his  after  life,  alternated 
with  brief  efforts  of  strenuous  exertion.  His  want  of  sight 
prevented  him  from  sharing  in  the  ordinary  childish  sports ; 
and  one  of  his  great  pleasures  was  in  reading  old  romances 
— a  taste  which  he  retained  through  life.  Boys  of  this 
temperament  are  generally  despised  by  their  fellows ;  but 
Johnson  seems  to  have  had  the  power  of  enforcing  tho 
respect  of  his  companions.  Three  of  the  lads  used  to  come 
for  him  in  the  morning  and  carry  him  in  triumph  to  school, 
seated  upon  the  shoulders  of  one  and  supported  on  each 
side  by  his  companions. 

After  learning  to  read  at  a  dame-school,  and  from  a 
certain  Tom  Brown,  of  whom  it  is  only  recorded  that  he 
published  a  spelling-book  and  dedicated  it  to  the  Universe, 
young  Samuel  was  sent  to  the  Lichfield  Grammar  School, 
and  was  afterwards,  for  a  short  time,  apparently  in  the 
character  of  pupil-teacher,  at  the  school  of  Stourbridge,  in 
Worcestershire.  A  good  deal  of  Latin  was  "  whipped  into 
him,"  and  though  he  complained  of  the  excessive  severity 
of  two  of  his  teachers,  he  was  always  a  believer  in  the 
virtues  of  the  rod.  A  child,  he  said,  who  is  flogged,  "  gets 
his  task,  and  there's  an  end  on't ;  whereas  by  exciting 
emulation  and  comparisons  of  superiority,  you  lay  the 


6  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

foundations  of  lasting  mischief ;  you  make  "brothers  and 
sisters  hate  each  other."  In  practice,  indeed,  this  stern 
disciplinarian  seems  to  have  been  specially  indulgent  to 
children.  The  memory  of  his  own  sorrows  made  him 
value  their  happiness,  and  he  rejoiced  greatly  when  he  at 
last  persuaded  a  schoolmaster  to  remit  the  old-fashioned 
holiday-task. 

Johnson  left  school  at  sixteen  and  spent  two  years  at 
home,  prohahly  in  learning  his  father's  "business.  This 
seems  to  have  been  the  chief  period  of  his  studies.  Long 
afterwards  he  said  that  he  knew  almost  as  much  at  eighteen 
as  he  did  at  the  age  of  fifty-three — the  date  of  the  remark. 
His  father's  shop  would  give  him  many  opportunities,  and 
he  devoured  what  came  in  his  way  with  the  undiscrimi- 
nating  eagerness  of  a  .young  student.  His  intellectual 
resembled  his  physical  appetite.  He  gorged  books.  He 
tore  the  hearts  out  of  them,  but  did  not  study  systemati- 
cally. Do  you  read  books  through  1  he  asked  indignantly 
of  some  one  who  expected  from  him  such  supererogatory 
labour.  His  memory  enabled  him  to  accumulate  great 
stores  of  a  desultory  and  unsystematic  knowledge.  Some- 
how he  became  a  fine  Latin  scholar,  though  never  first- 
rate  as  a  Grecian.  The  direction  of  his  studies  was  partly 
determined  by  the  discovery  of  a  folio  of  Petrarch,  lying 
on  a  shelf  where  he  was  looking  for  apples  ;  and  one  of  his 
earliest  literary  plans,  never  carried  out,  was  an  edition  of 
Politian,  with  a  history  of  Latin  poetry  from  the  time  of 
Petrarch.  When  he  went  to  the  University  at  the  end  of 
this  period,  he  was  in  possession  of  a  very  unusual  amount 
of  reading. 

Meanwhile  he  was  beginning  to  feel  the  pressure  of 
poverty.  His  father's  affairs  were  probably  getting  into 
disorder.  One  anecdote — it  is  one  which  it  is  difficult 


I.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE.  7 

to  read  -without  emotion — refers  to  this  period.  Many 
years  afterwards,  Johnson,  worn  by  disease  and  the  hard 
struggle  of  life,  was  staying  at  Lichfield,  where  a  few  old 
friends  still  survived,  but  in  which  every  street  must  have 
revived  the  memories  of  the  many  who  had  long  since 
gone  over  to  the  majority.  He  was  missed  one  morning 
at  breakfast,  and  did  not  return  till  supper-time.  Then 
lie  told  how  his  time  had  been  passed.  On  that  day  fifty 
years  before,  his  father,  confined  by  illness,  had  begged  him 
to  take  his  place  to  sell  books  at  a  stall  at  Uttoxeter.  Pride 
made  him  refuse.  "  To  do  away  with  the  sin  of  this  dis- 
obedience, I  this  day  went  in  a  post-chaise  to  Uttoxeter, 
and  going  into  the  market  at  the  time  of  high  business, 
uncovered  my  head  and  stood  with  it  bare  an  hour  before 
the  stall  which  my  father  had  formerly  used,  exposed  to 
the  sneers  of  the  standers-by  and  the  inclemency  of  the 
weather ;  a  penance  by  which  I  trust  I  have  propitiated 
Heaven  for  this  only  instance,  I  believe,  of  contumacy  to 
my  father."  If  the  anecdote  illustrates  the  touch  of 
superstition  in  Johnson's  mind,  it  reveals  too  that  sacred 
depth  of  tenderness  which  ennobled  his  character.  No 
repentance  can  ever  wipe  out  the  past  or  make  it  be  as 
though  it  had  not  been ;  but  the  remorse  of  a  fine  cha- 
racter may  be  transmuted  into  a  permanent  source  of 
nobler  views  of  life  and  the  world. 

There  are  difficulties  in  determining  the  circumstances 
and  duration  of  Johnson's  stay  at  Oxford.  He  began 
residence  at  Pembroke  College  in  1728.  It  seems  pro- 
bable that  he  received  some  assistance  from  a  gentle- 
man whose  son  took  him  as  companion,  and  from  the 
clergy  of  Lichfield,  to  whom  his  father  was  known, 
and  who  were  aware  of  the  son's  talents.  Possibly 
his  college  assisted  him  during  part  of  the  time.  It 


8  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

is  certain  that  he  left  -without  taking  a  degree, 
though  he  probably  resided  for  nearly  three  years.  It 
is  certain,  also,  that  his  father's  bankruptcy  made  his 
stay  difficult,  and  that  the  period  must  have  been  one  of 
trial. 

The  effect  of  the  Oxford  residence  upon  Johnson's  mind 
was  characteristic.  The  lad  already  suffered  from  the 
attacks  of  melancholy,  which  sometimes  drove  him  to  the 
borders  of  insanity.  At  Oxford,  Law's  Serious  Call 
gave  him  the  strong  religious  impressions  which  remained 
through  life.  But  he  does  not  seem  to  have  been  regarded 
as  a  gloomy  or  a  religious  youth  by  his  contemporaries. 
When  told  in  after  years  that  he  had  been  described  as  a 
"  gay  and  frolicsome  fellow,"  he  replied,  "  Ah  !  sir,  I  was 
mad  and  violent.  It  was  bitterness  which  they  mistook 
for  frolic.  I  was  miserably  poor,  and  I  thought  to  fight 
my  way  by  my  literature  and  my  wit ;  so  I  disregarded 
all  power  and  all  authority."  Though  a  hearty  supporter 
of  authority  in  principle,  Johnson  was  distinguished 
through  life  by  the  strongest  spirit  of  personal  indepen- 
dence and  self-respect.  He  held,  too,  the  sound  doctrine, 
deplored  by  his  respectable  biographer  Hawkins,  that  the 
scholar's  life,  like  the  Christian's,  levelled  all  distinctions 
of  rank.  When  an  officious  benefactor  put  a  pair  of  new 
shoes  at  his  door,  he  threw  them  away  with  indignation. 
He  seems  to  have  treated  his  tutors  with  a  contempt  which 
Boswell  politely  attributed  to  "great  fortitude  of  mind," 
but  Johnson  himself  set  down  as  "  stark  insensibility." 
The  life  of  a  poor  student  is  not,  one  may  fear,  even  yet 
exempt  from  much  bitterness,  and  in  those  days  the 
position  was  far  more  servile  than  at  present.  The  ser- 
vitors and  sizars  had  much  to  bear  from  richer  companions. 
A  proud  melancholy  lad,  conscious  of  great  poAvers,  had 


i.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EAELY  LIFE.  9 

to  meet  with  hard  rebuffs,  and  tried  to  meet  them  "by 
returning  scorn  for  scorn. 

Such  distresses,  however,  did  not  shake  Johnson's 
rooted  Toryism.  He  fully  imbibed,  if  he  did  not  already 
share,  the  strongest  prejudices  of  the  place,  and  his  misery 
never  produced  a  revolt  against  the  system,  though  it  may 
have  fostered  insolence  to  individuals.  Three  of  the  most 
eminent  men  with  whom  Johnson  came  in  contact  in  later 
life,  had  also  been  students  at  Oxford.  "Wesley,  his  senior 
by  six  years,  was  a  fellow  of  Lincoln  whilst  Johnson  was 
an  undergraduate,  and  was  learning  at  Oxford  the  neces- 
sity of  rousing  his  countrymen  from  the  religious  lethargy 
into  which  they  had  sunk.  "  Have  not  pride  and 
haughtiness  of  spirit,  impatience,  and  peevishness,  sloth 
and  indolence,  gluttony  and  sensuality,  and  even  a  pro- 
verbial uselessness  been  objected  to  us,  perhaps  not  always 
by  our  enemies  nor  wholly  without  ground  1 "  So  said 
Wesley,  preaching  before  the  University  of  Oxford  in  1744, 
and  the  words  in  his  mouth  imply  more  than  the  preacher's 
formality.  Adam  Smith,  Johnson's  junior  by  fourteen 
years,  was  so  impressed  by  the  utter  indifference  of  Oxford 
authorities  to  their  duties,  as  to  find  in  it  an  admirable 
illustration  of  the  consequences  of  the  neglect  of  the  true 
principles  of  supply  and  demand  implied  in  the  endow- 
ment of  learning.  Gibbon,  his  junior  by  twenty-eight 
years,  passed  at  Oxford  the  "  most  idle  and  unprofitable  " 
months  of  his  whole  Life ;  and  was,  he  said,  as  willing  to 
disclaim  the  university  for  a  mother,  as  she  could  be  to 
renounce  him  for  a  son.  Oxford,  as  judged  by  these  men, 
was  remarkable  as  an  illustration  of  the  spiritual  and 
intellectual  decadence  of  a  body  which  at  other  times  has 
been  a  centre  of  great  movements  of  thought.  Johnson, 
though  his  experience  was  rougher  than  any  of  the  three, 


10  SAMUEL  JOHNSOX.  [CHAP. 

loved  Oxford  as  though  she  had  not  been  a  harsh  step- 
mother to  his  youth.  Sir,  he  said  fondly  of  his  college, 
"  we  are  a  nest  of  singing-birds."  Most  of  the  strains  are 
now  pretty  well  forgotten,  and  some  of  them  must  at  all 
times  have  been  such  as  we  scarcely  associate  with  the 
nightingale.  Johnson,  however,  cherished  his  college 
friendships,  delighted  in  paying  visits  to  his  old  university, 
and  was  deeply  touched  by  the  academical  honours  by 
which  Oxford  long  afterwards  recognized  an  eminence 
scarcely  fostered  by  its  protection.  Far  from  sharing  the 
.doctrines  of  Adam  Smith,  he  only  regretted  that  the 
universities  were  not  richer,  and  expressed  a  desire  which 
will  be  understood  by  advocates  of  the  "  endowment  of 
research,"  that  there  were  many  places  of  a  thousand  a 
year  at  Oxford. 

On  leaving  the  University,  in  1731,  the  world  was  all 
before  him.  His  father  died  in  the  end  of  the  year,  and 
Johnson's  whole  immediate  inheritance  was  twenty 
pounds.  Where  was  he  to  turn  for  daily  bread  1  Even 
in  those  days,  most  gates  were  barred  with  gold  and 
opened  but  to  golden  keys.  The  greatest  chance  for  a  poor 
man  was  probably  through  the  Church.  The  career  of 
Warburton,  who  rose  from  a  similar  position  to  a  bishopric 
might  have  been  rivalled  by  Johnson,  and  his  connexions 
with  Lichfield  might,  one  would  suppose,  have  helped 
him  to  a  start.  It  would  be  easy  to  speculate  upon  causes 
which  might  have  hindered  such  a  career.  In  later  life,  ho 
more  than  once  refused  to  take  orders  upon  the  promise 
of  a  living.  Johnson,  as  we  know  him,  was  a  man  of 
the  world ;  though  a  religious  man  of  the  world.  He 
represents  the  secular  rather  than  the  ecclesiastical  type. 
So  far  as  his  mode  of  teaching  goes,  he  is  rather  a  disciple 
of  Socrates  than  of  St.  Paul  or  "Wesley.  According  to 


I.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EAELY  LIFE.  11 

him,  a  "  tavern-chair  "  was  "  the  throne  of  human  felicity," 
and  supplied  a  better  arena  than  the  pulpit  for  the  utterance 
of  his  message  to  mankind.  And,  though  his  external 
circumstances  doubtless  determined  his  method,  there  was 
much  in  his  character  which  made  it  congenial.  Johnson's 
religious  emotions  were  such  as  to  make  habitual  reserve 
almost  a  sanitary  necessity.  They  were  deeply  coloured 
by  his  constitutional  melancholy.  Fear  of  death  and  hell 
were  prominent  in  his  personal  creed.  To  trade  upon  his 
feelings  like  a  charlatan  would  have  been  abhorrent  to  his 
masculine  character  ;  and  to  give  them  full  and  frequent 
utterance  like  a  genuine  teacher  of  mankind  would  have 
been  to  imperil  his  sanity.  If  he  had  gone  through  the 
excitement  of  a  Methodist  conversion,  he  would  probably 
have  ended  his  days  in  a  madhouse. 

Such  considerations,  however,  were  not,  one  may  guess, 
distinctly  present  to  Johnson  himself;  and  the  offer  of  a 
college  fellowship  or  of  private  patronage  might  probably 
have  altered  his  career.  He  might  have  become  a  learned 
recluse  or  a  struggling  Parson  Adams.  College  fellowships 
were  less  open  to  talent  then  than  now,  and  patrons  were 
never  too  propitious  to  the  uncouth  giant,  who  had  to  force 
his  way  by  sheer  labour,  and  fight 'for  his  own  hand.  Ac- 
cordingly, the  young  scholar  tried  to  coin  his  brains  into 
money  by  the  most  depressing  and  least  hopeful  of  employ- 
ments. By  becoming  an  usher  in  a  school,  he  could  at  least 
turn  his  talents  to  account  with  little  delay,  and  that  was 
the  most  pressing  consideration.  By  one  schoolmaster  he 
was  rejected  on  the  ground  that  his  infirmities  would  excite 
the  ridicule  of  the  boys.  Under  another  he  passed  some 
months  of  "  complicated  misery,"  and  could  never  think 
of  the  school  without  horror  and  aversion.  Finding  this 
situation  intolerable,  he  settled  in  Birmingham,  in  1733, 


12  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

to  be  near  an  old  schoolfellow,  named  Hector,  who  was 
apparently  beginning  to  practise  as  a  surgeon.  Johnson 
seems  to  have  had  some  acquaintances  among  the  com- 
fortable families  in  the  neighbourhood ;  but  his  means  of 
living  are  obscure.  Some  small  literary  work  came  in  his 
way.  He  contributed  essays  to  a  local  paper,  and  translated 
a  book  of  Travels  in  Abyssinia.  For  this,  his  first  publica- 
ti6n,  he  received  five  guineas.  In  1734  he  made  certain 
overtures  to  Cave,  a  London  publisher,  of  the  result  of 
which  I  shall  have  to  speak  presently.  For  the  present  it 
is  pretty  clear  that  the  great  problem  of  self-support  had 
been  very  inadequately  solved. 

Having  no  money  and  no  prospects,  Johnson  naturally 
married.  The  attractions  of  the  lady  were  not  very 
manifest  to  others  than  her  husband.  She  was  the 
widow  of  a  Birmingham  mercer  named  Porter.  Her  ago 
at  the  time  (1735)  of  the  second  marriage  was  forty-eight, 
the  bridegroom  being  not  quite  twenty-six.  The  bio- 
grapher's eye  was  not  fixed  upon  Johnson  till  after  his 
wife's  death,  and  wo  have  little  in  the  way  of  authentic 
description  of  her  person  and  character.  Garrick,  who 
had  known  her,  said  that  she  was  very  fat,  with  cheeks 
coloured  both  by  paint  and  cordials,  flimsy  and  fantastic 
in  dress  and  affected  in  her  manners.  She  is  said  to  have 
treated  her  husband  with  some  contempt,  adopting  the 
airs  of  an  antiquated  beauty,  which  he  returned  by 
elaborate  deference.  Garrick  used  his  wonderful  powers 
of  mimicry  to  make  fun  of  the  uncouth  caresses  of  the 
husband,  and  the  courtly  Beauclerc  used  to  provoke  the 
smiles  of  his  audience  by  repeating  Johnson's  assertion 
that  "  it  was  a  love-match  on  both  sides."  One  incident 
of  the  wedding-day  was  ominous.  As  the  newly-married 
couple  rode  back  from  church,  Mrs.  Johnson  showed  her 


i.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE.  13 

spirit  by  reproaching  her  husband  for  riding  too  fast,  and 
then  for  lagging  behind.  Resolved  "  not  to  be  made  the 
slave  of  caprice,"  he  pushed  on  briskly  till  he  was  fairly 
out  of  sight.  When  she  rejoined  him,  as  he,  of  course, 
took  care  that  she  should  soon  do,  she  was  in  tears.  Mrs. 
Johnson  apparently  knew  how  to  regain  supremacy ;  but, 
at  any  rate,  Johnson  loved  her  devotedly  during  life,  and 
clung  to  her  memory  during  a  widowhood  of  more  than 
thirty  years,  as  fondly  as  if  they  had  been  the  most 
pattern  hero  and  heroine  of  romantic  fiction. 

Whatever  Mrs.  Johnson's  charms,  she  seems  to  have 
been  a  woman  of  good  sense  and  some  literary  judgment. 
Johnson's  grotesque  appearance  did  not  prevent  her  from 
saying  to  her  daughter  on  their  first  introduction,  "  This  is 
the  most  sensible  man  I  ever  met."  Her  praises  were,  we 
may  believe,  sweeter  to  him  than  those  of  the  severest 
critics,  or  the  most  fervent  of  personal  flatterers.  Like  all 
good  men,  Johnson  loved  good  women,  and  liked  to  have  on 
hand  a  flirtation  or  two,  as  warm  as  might  be  within  the 
bounds  of  due  decorum.  Eut  nothing  affected  his  fidelity 
to  his  Letty  or  displaced  her  image  in  his  mind.  He 
remembered  her  in  many  solemn  prayers,  and  such  words 
as  "  this  was  dear  Letty 's  book  :"  or,  "  this  was  a  prayer 
which  dear  Letty  was  accustomed  to  say,"  were  found 
written  by  him  in  many  of  her  books  of  devotion. 

Mrs.  Johnson  had  one  other  recommendation — a  fortune, 
namely,  of  £800 — little  enough,  even  then,  as  a  provision 
for  the  support  of  the  married  pair,  but  enough  to  help 
Johnson  to  make  a  fresh  start.  In  1736,  there  appeared 
an  advertisement  in  the  Gentleman's  Magazine.  "  At 
Edial,  near  Lichfield,  in  Staffordshire,  young  gentlemen 
are  boarded  and  taught  the  Latin  and  Greek  languages  by 
Samuel  Johnson."  If,  as  seems  probable,  Mrs.  Johnson's 


14  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

money  supplied  the  funds  for  this  venture,  it  was  an 
unlucky  speculation. 

Johnson  was  not  fitted  to  be  a  pedagogue.  Success  in  that 
profession  implies  skill  in  the  management  of  pupils,  but 
perhaps  sti.1!  more  decidedly  in  the  management  of  parents. 
Johnson  had  little  qualifications  in  either  way.  As  a 
teacher  he  would  probably  have  been  alternately  despotic 
and  over-indulgent ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  at  a  single 
glance  the  rough  Dominie  Sampson  would  be  enough  to 
frighten  the  ordinary  parent  off  his  premises.  Very  few 
pupils  came,  and  they  seem  to  have  profited  little,  if  a  story 
as  told  of  two  of  his  pupils  refers  to  this  time.  After  some 
months  of  instruction  in  English  history,  he  asked  them 
who  had  destroyed  the  monasteries  ]  One  of  them  gave  no 
answer ;  the  other  replied  "  Jesus  Christ."  Johnson,  how- 
ever, could  boast  of  one  eminent  pupil  in  David  Garrick, 
though,  by  Garrick's  account,  his  master  was  of  little  service 
except  as  affording  an  excellent  mark  for  his  early  powers  of 
ridicule.  The  school,  or  "  academy,"  failed  after  a  year  and 
a  half ;  and  Johnson,  once  more  at  a  loss  for  employment, 
resolved  to  try  the  great  experiment,  made  so  often  and  so 
often  unsuccessfully.  He  left  Lichfield  to  seek  his  fortune 
in  London.  Garrick  accompanied  him,  and  the  two 
brought  a  common  letter  of  introduction  to  the  master  of 
an  academy  from  Gilbert  Walmsley,  registrar  of  the  Pre- 
rogative Court  in  Lichfield.  Long  afterwards  Johnson 
took  an  opportunity  in  the  Lives  of  the  Poets,  of  expressing 
his  warm  regard  for  the  memory  of  his  early  friend,  to 
whom  he  had  been  recommended  by  a  community  of 
literary  tastes,  in  spite  of  party  differences  and  great 
inequality  of  age.  "VValmsley  says  in  his  letter,  that  "  one 
Johnson  "  is  about  to  accompany  Garrick  to  London,  in 
order  to  try  his  fate  with  a  tragedy  and  get  himself  eni- 


i.]  CHILDHOOD  AND  EARLY  LIFE.  15 

ployed  in  translation.  Johnson,  he  adds,  "  is  a  very  good 
scholar  and  poet,  and  I  have  great  hopes  will  turn  out  a 
fine  tragedy  writer." 

The  letter  is  dated  March  2nd,  1737.  Eefore  recording 
what  is  known  of  his  early  career  thus  started,  it  will  be 
well  to  take  a  glance  at  the  general  condition  of  the  pro- 
fession of  Literature  iu  England  at  this  period. 


16  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 


CHAPTER  II. 

LITERARY     CAREER. 

"  No  man  but  a  blockhead,"  said  Johnson,  "  ever  wrote 
except  for  money."  The  doctrine  is,  of  course,  perfectly 
outrageous,  and  specially  calculated  to  shock  people  who 
like  to  keep  it  for  their  private  use,  instead  of  proclaiming 
it  in  public.  But  it  is  a  good  expression  of  that  huge  con- 
tempt for  the  foppery  of  high-flown  sentiment  which,  as  is 
not  uncommon  with  Johnson,  passes  into  something  which 
would  be  cynical  if  it  were  not  half-humorous.  In  this 
case  it  implies  also  the  contempt  of  the  professional  for 
the  amateur.  Johnson  despised  gentlemen  who  dabbled 
in  his  craft,  as  a  man  whose  life  is  devoted  to  music  or 
painting  despises  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  who  treat  those 
arts  as  fashionable  accomplishments.  An  author  was, 
according  to  him,  a  man  who  turned  out  books  as  a  brick- 
layer turns  out  houses  or  a  tailor  coats.  So  long  as  he 
supplied  a  good  article  and  got  a  fair  price,  he  was  a  fool 
to  grumble,  and  a  humbug  to  affect  loftier  motives. 

Johnson  was  not  the  first  professional  author,  in  this  sense, 
but  perhaps  the  first  man  who  made  the  profession  respect- 
able. The  principal  habitat  of  authors,  in  his  age,  was 
Grub  Street — a  region  which,  in  later  years,  has  ceased  to 
be  ashamed  of  itself,  and  has  adopted  the  more  pretentious 


«.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  17 

name  Bohemia.  The  original  Grub  Street,  it  is  said,  first 
became  associated  with  authorship  during  the  increase 
of  pamphlet  literature,  produced  by  the  civil  wars.  Fox, 
the  martyrologist,  was  one  of  its  original  inhabitants. 
Another  of  its  heroes  was  a  certain  Mr.  Welby,  of  whom 
the  sole  record  is,  that  he  "  lived  there  forty  years  without 
being  seen  of  any."  In  fact,  it  was  a  region  of  holes  and 
corners,  calculated  to  illustrate  that  great  advantage  of 
London  life,  which  a  friend  of  Boswell's  described  by  say- 
ing, that  a  man  could  there  be  always  "  close  to  his  bur- 
row." The  "  burrow  "  which  received  the  luckless  wight, 
was  indeed  no  pleasant  refuge.  Since  poor  Green,  in  the 
earliest  generation  of  dramatists,  bought  his  "  groat'sworth 
of  wit  with  a  million  of  repentance,"  too  many  of  his 
brethren  had  trodden  the  path  which  led  to  hopeless 
misery  or  death  in  a  tavern  brawl.  The  history  of  men 
who  had  to  support  themselves  by  their  pens,  is  a  record 
of  almost  universal  gloom.  The  names  of  Spenser,  of 
Butler,  and  of  Otway,  are  enough  to  remind  us  that  even 
warm  contemporary  recognition  was  not  enough  to  raise 
an  author  above  the  fear  of  dying  in  want  of  necessaries. 
The  two  great  dictators  of  literature,  Ben  Jonson  in  the 
earlier  and  Dryden  in  the  later  part  of  the  century,  only 
kept  their  heads  above  water  by  help  of  the  laureate's  pit- 
tance, though  reckless  imprudence,  encouraged  by  the 
precarious  life,  was  the  cause  of  much  of  their  sufferings. 
Patronage  gave  but  a  fitful  resource,  and  the  author  could 
hope  at  most  but  an  occasional  crust,  flung  to  him  from 
better  provided  tables. 

In  the  happy  days  of  Queen  Anne,  it  is  true,  there  had 

been  a  gleam  of  prosperity.     Many   authors,  Addison, 

Congreve,  Swift,  and  others  of  less  name,  had  won  by 

their   pens   not   only  temporary  profits   but   permanent 

2 


18  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

places.  The  class  which  came  into  power  at  the  Kevolu- 
tion  was  willing  for  a  time,  to  share  some  of  the  public 
patronage  with  men  distinguished  for  intellectual  emi- 
nence. Patronage  was  liberal  when  the  funds  came  out 
of  other  men's  pockets.  But,  as  the  system  of  party 
government  developed,  it  soon  became  evident  that  this 
involved  a  waste  of  power.  There  were  enough  political 
partisans  to  absorb  all  the  comfortable  sinecures  to  be 
had ;  and  such  money  as  was  still  spent  upon  literature, 
was  given  in  return  for  services  equally  degrading  to  giver 
and  receiver.  .Nor  did  the  patronage  of  literature  reach 
the  poor  inhabitants  of  Grub  Street.  Addison's  poetical 
power  might  suggest  or  justify  the  gift  of  a  place  from 
his  elegant  friends ;  but  a  man  like  De  Foe,  who  really 
looked  to  his  pen  for  great  part  of  his  daily  subsistence, 
was  below  the  region  of  such  prizes,  and  was  obliged  in  later 
years  not  only  to  write  inferior  books  for  money,  but  to 
sell  himself  and  act  as  a  spy  upon  his  fellows.  One  great 
man,  it  is  true,  made  an  independence  by  literature.  Pope 
received  some  £8000  for  his  translation  of  Homer,  by  the 
then  popular  mode  of  subscription — a  kind  of  compromise 
between  the  systems  of  patronage  and  public  support.  But 
his  success  caused  little  pleasure  in  Grub  Street.  No  love 
was  lost  between  the  poet  and  the  dwellers  in  this  dismal 
region.  Pope  was  its  deadliest  enemy,  and  carried  on  an  in- 
ternecine warfare  with  its  inmates,  which  has  enriched  our 
language  with  a  great  satire,  but  which  wasted  his  powers 
upon  low  objects,  and  tempted  bim  into  disgraceful  artifices. 
The  life  of  the  unfortunate  victims,  pilloried  in  the  Dun- 
dad  and  accused  of  the  unpardonable  sins  of  poverty  and 
dependence,  was  too  often  one  which  might  have  extorted 
sympathy  even  from  a  thin-skinned  poet  and  critic. 
Illustrations  of  the  manners  and  customs  of  that  Grub 


II.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  19 

Street  of  which  Johnson  was  to  become  an  inmate  are  only 
too  abundant.  The  best  writers  of  the  day  could  tell  of 
hardships  endured  in  that  dismal  region.  Eichardson 
went  on  the  sound  principle  of  keeping  his  shop  that  his 
shop  might  keep  him.  But  the  other  great  novelists  of 
the  century  have  painted  from,  life  the  miseries  of  an 
author's  existence.  Fielding,  Smollett,  and  Goldsmith 
have  described  the  poor  wretches  with  a  vivid  force  which 
gives  sadness  to  the  reflection  that  each  of  those  great  men 
was  drawing  upon  his  own  experience,  and  that  they  each 
died  in  distress.  The  Case  of  Authors  ly  Profession 
to  quote  the  title  of  a  pamphlet  by  Ralph,  was  indeed  a 
wretched  one,  when  the  greatest  of  their  number  had  an 
incessant  struggle  to  keep  the  wolf  from  the  door.  The 
life  of  an  author  resembled  the  proverbial  existence  of  the 
flying-fish,  chased  by  enemies  in  sea  and  in  air ;  he  only 
escaped  from  the  slavery  of  the  bookseller's  garret,  to  fly 
from  the  bailiff  or  rot  in  the  debtor's  ward  or  the  spunging- 
house.  Many  strange  half-pathetic  and  half-ludicrous  anec- 
dotes survive  to  recall  the  sorrows  and  the  recklessness  of 
the  luckless  scribblers  who,  like  one  of  Johnson's  acquain- 
tance, "  lived  in  London  and  hung  loose  upon  society." 

There  was  Samuel  Boyse,  for  example,  whose  poem  on 
the  Deity  is  quoted  with  high  praise  by  Fielding.  Once 
Johnson  had  generously  exerted  himself  for  his  comrade  in 
misery,  and  collected  enough  money  by  sixpences  to  get 
the  poet's  clothes  out  of  pawn.  Two  days  afterwards, 
Boyse  had  spent  the  money  and  was  found  in  bed,  covered 
only  with  a  blanket,  through  two  holes  in  which  he  passed 
his  arms  to  write.  Boyse,  it  appears,  when  still  in  this  posi- 
tion would  lay  out  his  last  half-guinea  to  buy  truffles  and 
mushrooms  for  his  last  scrap  of  beef.  Of  another  scribbler 
Johnson  said,  "  I  honour  Derrick  for  his  strength  of  mind. 


20  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [ciur. 

One  night  when  Floyd  (another  poor  author)  was  wander- 
ing about  the  streets  at  night,  he  found  Derrick  fast  asleep 
upon  a  bulk.  Upon  being  suddenly  awaked,  Derrick 
started  up ;  '  My  dear  Floyd,  I  am  sorry  to  see  you  in  this 
destitute  state;  will  you  go  home  with  me  to  my  lodgings?' " 
Authors  in  such  circumstances  might  be  forced  into  such 
a  wonderful  contract  as  that  which  is  reported  to  have 
been  drawn  up  by  one  Gardner  with  Eolt  and  Christopher 
Smart.  They  were  to  write  a  monthly  miscellany,  sold  at 
sixpence,  and  to  have  a  third  of  the  profits ;  but  they  were 
to  write  nothing  else,  and  the  contract  was  to  last  for 
ninety-nine  years.  Johnson  himself  summed  up  the  trade 
upon  earth  by  the  lines  in  which  Virgil  describes  the 
entrance  to  hell  j  thus  translated  by  Dryden  : — 

Just  in  the  gate  and  in  the  jaws  of  hell, 

Eevengeful  cares  and  sullen  sorrows  dwell. 

And  pale  diseases  and  repining  age, 

Want,  fear,  and  famine's  unresisted  rage  : 

Here  toils  and  Death  and  Death's  half-brother,  Sleep — 

Forms,  terrible  to  view,  their  sentry  keep. 

"  Kbw,"  said  Johnson,  "  almost  all  these  apply  exactly 
to  an  author;  these  are  the  concomitants  of  a  printing- 
house." 

Judicious  authors,  indeed,  were  learning  how  to  make 
literature  pay.  Some  of  them  belonged  to  the  class  who 
understood  the  great  truth  that  the  scissors  are  a  very 
superior  implement  to  the  pen  considered  as  a  tool  of 
literary  trade.  Such,  for  example,  was  that  respectable 
Dr.  John  Campbell,  whose  parties  Johnson  ceased  to  fre- 
quent lest  Scotchmen  should  say  of  any  good  bits  of  work, 
"  Ay,  ay,  he  has  learnt  this  of  Cawmell."  Campbell,  he  said 
quaintly,  was  a  good  man,  a  pious  man.  "  I  am  afraid  he 


li.]  LITEEAEY  CAEEEB.  21 

has  not  been  in  the  inside  of  a  church  for  many  years  ;\  ** 
but  he  never  passes  a  church  without  pulling  off  his  hat. 
This  shows  he  has  good  principles," — of  which  in  fact  there 
seems  to  be  some  less  questionable  evidence.  Campbell  sup- 
ported himself  by  writings  chiefly  of  the  Encyclopedia  or 
Gazetteer  kind ;  and  became,  still  in  Johnson's  phrase,  "the 
richest  author  that  ever  grazed  the  common  of  literature." 
A  more  singular  and  less  reputable  character  was  that 
impudent  quack,  Sir  John  Hill,  who,  with  his  insolent 
attacks  upon  the  Royal  Society,  pretentious  botanical  and 
medical  compilations,  plays,  novels,  and  magazine  articles, 
has  long  sunk  into  titter  oblivion.  It  is  said  of  him  that 
he  pursued  every  branch  of  literary  quackery  with  greater 
contempt  of  character  than  any  man  of  his  time,  and  that 
he  made  as  much  as  £1500  in  a  year; — three  times  as 
much,  it  is  added,  as  any  one  writer  ever  made  in  the 
same  period. 

The  political  scribblers — the  Arnalls,  Gordons,  Trench- 
ards,  Guthries,  Ralphs,  and  Amhersts,  whose  names  meet 
us  in  the  notes  to  the  Dunciad  and  in  contemporary 
pamphlets  and  newspapers — form  another  variety  of  the 
class.  Their  general  character  may  be  estimated  from 
Johnson's  classification  of  the  "  Scribbler  for  a  Party"  with 
the  "  Commissioner  of  Excise,"  as  the  "  two  lowest  of  all 
human  beings."  "  Ralph,"  says  one  of  the  notes  to  the 
Dunciad,  "  ended  in  the  common  sink  of  all  such  writers, 
a  political  newspaper."  The  prejudice  against  such  em- 
ployment has  scarcely  died  out  in  our  own  day,  and  may 
be  still  traced  in  the  account  of  Pendennis  and  his  friend 
Warringtoa.  People  who  do  dirty  Avork  must  be  paid  for 
it ;  and  the  Secret  Committee  which  inquired  into  Wai- 
pole's  administration  reported  that  in  ten  years,  from  1731 
to  1741,  a  sum  of  £50,077  18s.  had  been  paid  to  writers 


22  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

and  printers  of  newspapers.  Arnall,  now  remembered 
chiefly  by  Pope's  line, — 

Spirit  of  Arnall,  aid  me  whilst  I  lie ! 

had  received,  in  four  years,  £10,997  Gs.  8<7.  of  this  amount. 
The  more  successful  writers  might  look  to  pensions  or  pre- 
ferment. Francis,  for  example,  the  translator  of  Horace, 
and  the  father,  in  all  probability,  of  the  most  formidable 
of  the  whole  tribe  of  such  literary  gladiators,  received,  it 
is  said,  900Z.  a  year  for  his  work,  besides  being  appointed 
to  a  rectory  and  the  chaplaincy  of  Chelsea: 

It  must,  moreover,  be  observed  that  the  price  of  literary 
work  was  rising  during  the  century,  and  that,  in  the  latter 
half,  considerable  sums  were  received  by  successful  writers. 
Religious  as  well  as  dramatic  literature  had  begun  to  be 
commercially  valuable.  Baxter,  in  the  previous  century, 
made  from  60Z.  to  80Z.  a  year  by  his  pen.  The  copyright 
of  Tillotson's  Sermons  was  sold,  it  is  said,  upon  his  death 
for  £2500.  Considerable  sums  were  made  by  the  plan  of 
publishing  by  subscription.  It  is  said  that  4600  people 
subscribed  to  the  two  posthumous  volumes  of  Conybeare's 
Sermons.  A  few  poets  trod  in  Pope's  steps.  Young  made 
more  than  £3000  for  the  Satires  called  the  Universal  Pas- 
sion, published,  I  think,  on  the  same  plan  ;  and  the  Duke 
of  Wharton  is  said,  though  the  report  is  doubtful,  to  have 
given  him  £2000  for  the  same  work.  Gay  made  £1000 
by  his  Poems ;  £400  for  the  copyright  of  the  Beggar's 
Opera,  and  three  times  as  much  for  its  second  part,  Polly. 
Among  historians,  Hume  seems  to  have  received  £700  a 
volume ;  Smollett  made  £2000  by  his  catchpenny  rival 
publication ;  Henry  made  £3300  by  his  history ;  and 
Robertson,  after  the  booksellers  had  made  £6000  by  his 
History  of  Scotland,  sold  his  Charles  V.  for  £4500. 


u.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  2» 

Amongst  the  novelists,  Feilding  received  £700  for  Tom 
Jones  and  £1000  for  Amelia  ;  Sterne,  for  the  second  edi- 
tion of  the  first  part  of  Tristram  Shandy  and  for  two 
additional  volumes,  received  £650 ;  besides  which  Lord 
Fauconberg  gave  him  a  living  (most  inappropriate  acknow- 
ledgment, one  would  say!),  and  Warburton  a  purse  of  gold. 
Goldsmith  received  60  guineas  for  the  immortal  Vicar,  a 
fair  price,  according  to  Johnson,  for  a  work  by  a  then 
unknown  author.  By  each  of  his  plays  he  made  about 
£500,  and  for  the  eight  volumes  of  his  Natural  History 
he  received  800  guineas.  Towards  the  end  of  the  century, 
Mrs.  Badcliffe  got  £500  for  the  Mysteries  of  Udolplio, 
and  £800  for  her  last  work,  the  Italian.  Perhaps  the 
largest  sum  given  for  a  single  book  was  £6000  paid  to 
Hawkesworth  for  his  account  of  the  South  Sea  Expedi- 
tions. Home  Tooke  received  from  £4000  to  £5000  for 
the  Diversions  ofPurley  ;  and  it  is  added  by  his  biographer, 
though  it  seems  to  be  incredible,  that  Hay  ley  received  no 
less  than  £11,000  for  the  Life  of  Cowper.  This  was,  of 
course,  in  the  present  century,  when  we  are  already 
approaching  the  period  of  Scott  and  Byron. 

Such  sums  prove  that  some  few  authors  might  achieve 
independence  by  a  successful  work;  and  it  is  well  to 
remember  them  in  considering  Johnson's  life  from  the 
business  point  of  view.  Though  he  never  grumbled  at  the 
booksellers,  and  on  the  contrary,  was  always  ready  to  de- 
fend them  as  liberal  men,  he  certainly  failed,  whether  from 
carelessness  or  want  of  skill,  to  turn  them  to  as  much  > 
profit  as  many  less  celebrated  rivals.  Meanwhile,  pecu- 
niary success  of  this  kind  was  beyond  any  reasonable  hopes". 
A  man  who  has  to  work  like  his  own  dependent  Levett, 
and  to  make  the  "  modest  toil  of  every  day"  supply  "  the 
wants  of  every  day,"  must  discount  his  talents  until  he 


24  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

can  secure  leisure  for  some  more  sustaiued  effort.  Johnson, 
coming  up  from  the  country  to  seek  for  work,  could  have 
but  a  slender  prospect  of  rising  above  the  ordinary  level  of 
his  Grub  Street  companions  and  rivals.  One  publisher 
to  whom  he  applied  suggested  to  him  that  it  would  be  his 
wisest  course  to  buy  a  porter's  knot  and  carry  trunks ; 
and,  in  the  struggle  which  followed,  Johnson  must  some- 
times have  been  tempted  to  regret  that  the  advice  was  not 
taken. 

The  details  of  the  ordeal  through  which  he  was  now 
to  pass  have  naturally  vanished.  Johnson,  long  after- 
wards, burst  into  tears  on  recalling  the  trials  of  this  period. 
But,  at  the  time,  no  one  was  interested  in  noting  the 
history  of  an  obscure  literary  drudge,  and  it  has  not  been 
described  by  the  sufferer  himself.  What  we  know  is 
derived  from  a  few  letters  and  incidental  references  of 
Johnson  in  later  days.  On  first  arriving  in  London  he 
was  almost  destitute,  and  had  to  join  with  Garrick  in 
raising  a  loan  of  five  pounds,  which,  we  are  glad  to  say, 
was  repaid.  He  dined  far  cightpence  at  an  ordinary  :  a 
cut  of  meat  for  sixpence,  bread  for  a  penny,  and  a  penny 
to  the  waiter,  making  out  the  charge.  One  of  his 
acquaintance  had  told  him  that  a  man  might  live  in 
London  for  thirty  pounds  a  year.  Ten  pounds  would  pay 
for  clothes  ;  a  garret  might  be  hired  for  eighteen-pence  a 
week  ;  if  any  one  asked  for  an  address,  it  was  easy  to  reply, 
"  I  am  to  be  found  at  such  a  place."  Threepence  laid  out 
at  a  coffee-house  would  enable  him  to  pass  some  horn's  a 
day  in  good  company  ;  dinner  might  be  had  for  sixpence, 
a  bread-and-milk  breakfast  for  a  penny,  and  supper  was 
superfluous.  On  clean  shirt  day  you  might  go  abroad  and 
pay  visits.  This  leaves  a  surplus  of  nearly  one  pound 
from  the  thirty. 


II.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  25 

Johnson,  however,  had  a  wife  to  support ;  and  to  raise 
funds  for  even  so  ascetic  a  mode  of  existence  required 
steady  labour.  Often,  it  seems,  his  purse  was  at  the  very 
lowest  ebb.  One  of  his  letters  to  his  employer  is  signed 
impransus  ;  and  whether  or  not  the  dinnerless  condition 
was  in  this  case  accidental,  or  significant  of  absolute 
impecuniosity,  the  less  pleasant  interpretation  is  not  im- 
probable. He  would  walk  the  streets  all  night  with  his 
friend,  Savage,  when  their  combined  funds  could  not  pay 
for  a  lodging.  One  night,  as  he  told  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds 
in  later  years,  they  thus  perambulated  St.  James's  Square, 
warming  themselves  by  declaiming  against  Walpole,  and 
nobly  resolved  that  they  would  stand  by  their  country. 

Patriotic  enthusiasm,  however,  as  no  one  knew  better 
than  Johnson,  is  a  poor  substitute  for  bed  and  supper. 
Johnson  suffered  acutely  and  made  some  attempts  to 
escape  from  his  misery.  To  the  end  of  his  life,  he  was 
grateful  to  those  who  had  lent  him  a  helping  hand. 
"  Harry  Hervey,"  he  said  of  one  of  them  shortly  before 
his  death,  "  was  a  vicious  man,  but  very  kind  to  me.  If 
you  call  a  dog  Hervey,  I  shall  love  him."  Pope  was  im- 
pressed by  the  excellence  of  his  first  poem,  London, 
and  induced  Lord  Gower  to  write  to  a  friend  to  beg  Swift 
to  obtain  a  degree  for  Johnson  from  the  University  of 
Dublin.  The  terms  of  this  circuitous  application,  curious, 
as  bringing  into  connexion  three  of  the  most  eminent 
men  of  letters  of  the  day,  prove  that  the  youngest  of 
them  was  at  the  time  (1739)  in  deep  distress.  The  object  of 
the  degree  was  to  qualify  Johnson  for  a  mastership  of  £60 
a  year,  which  would  make  him  happy  for  life.  He  would 
rather,  said  Lord  Gower,  die  upon  the  road  to  Dublin  if 
an  examination  were  necessary,  "than  be  starved  to 
death  in  translating  for  booksellers,  which  has  been  his 
2* 


26  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

only  subsistence  for  some  time  past."  The  application 
failed,  however,  and  the  want  of  a  degree  was  equally 
fatal  to  another  application  to  be  admitted  to  practise  at 
Doctor's  Commons. 

Literature  was  thus  perforce  Johnson's  sole  support; 
and  by  literature  was  meant,  for  the  most  part,  drudgery 
of  the  kind  indicated  by  the  phrase,  "  translating  for  book- 
sellers." While  still  in  Lichfield,  Johnson  had,  as  I  have 
said,  written  to  Cave,  proposing  to  become  a  contributor 
to  the  Gentleman's  Magazine.  The  letter  was  one  of  those 
which  a  modern  editor  receives  by  the  dozen,  and  answers  as 
perfunctorily  as  his  conscience  will  allow.  It  seems,  how- 
ever, to  have  made  some  impression  upon  Cave,  and 
possibly  led  to  Johnson's  employment  by  him  on  his  first 
arrival  in  London.  From  1738  he  was  employed  both  on 
the  Magazine  and  iu  some  jobs  of  translation. 

Edward  Cave,  to  whom  we  are  thus  introduced,  was  a 
man  of  some  mark  in  the  history  of  literature.  Johnson 
always  spoke  of  him  with  affection  and  afterwards  wrote  his 
life  in  complimentary  terms.  Cave,  though  a  clumsy,  phleg- 
matic person  of  little  cultivation,  seems  to  have  been  one 
of  those  men  who,  whilst  destitute  of  real  critical  powers, 
have  a  certain  instinct  for  recognizing  the  commercial 
value  of  literary  wares.  He  had  become  by  this  time 
well-known  as  the  publisher  of  a  magazine  which  survives 
to  this  day.  Journals  containing  summaries  of  passing 
events  had  already  been  started.  Boyer's  Political  State 
of  Great  Britain  began  in  1711.  The  Historical  Regis- 
ter, which  added  to  a  chronicle  some  literary  notices,  was 
started  in  1716.  The  Grub  Street  Journal  was  another 
journal  with  fuller  critical  notices,  which  first  appeared  in 
1730  ;  and  these  two  seem  to  have  been  superseded  by  the 
Gentleman's  Magazine,  started  by  Cave  in  the  next  year. 


ii.]  LITEEAEY  CAEEEE.  27 

Johnson  saw  in  it  an  opening  for  the  employment  of  his 
literary  talents ;  and  regarded  its  contributions  with  that 
awe  so  natural  in  youthful  aspirants,  and  at  once  so  comic 
and  pathetic  to  writers  of  a  little  experience.  The  names 
of  many  of  Cave's  staff  are  preserved  in  a  note  to  Hawkins. 
One  or  two  of  them,  such  as  Birch  and  Akenside,  have 
still  a  certain  interest  for  students  of  literature ;  hut  few 
have  heard  of  the  great  Moses  Browne,  who  was  regarded 
as  the  great  poetical  light  of  the  magazine.  Johnson 
looked  up  to  him  as  a  leader  in  his  craft,  and  was 
graciously  taken  by  Cave  to  'an  alehouse  in  Clerkenwell, 
where,  wrapped  in  a  horseman's  coat,  and  "  a  great  bushy 
uncombed  wig,"  he  saw  Mr.  Browne  sitting  at  the  end  of 
a  long  table,  in  a  cloud  of  tobacco-smoke,  and  felt  the 
satisfaction  of  a  true  hero-worshipper. 

It  is  needless  to  describe  in  detail  the  literary  task-work 
done  by  Johnson  at  this  period,  the  Latin  poems  which 
he  contributed  in  praise  of  Cave,  and  of  Cave's  friends,  or 
the  Jacobite  squibs  by  which  he  relieved  his  anti-minis- 
terialist feelings.  One  incident  of  the  period  doubtless 
refreshed  the  soul  of  many  authors,  who  have  shared 
Campbell's  gratitude  to  Napoleon  for  the  sole  redeeming 
action  of  his  life — the  shooting  of  a  bookseller.  Johnson 
was  employed  by  Osborne,  a  rough  specimen  of  the  trade, 
to  make  a  catalogue  of  the  Harleian  Library.  Osborne 
offensively  reproved  him  for  negligence,  and  Johnson 
knocked  him  down  with  a  folio.  The  book  with  which 
the  feat  was  performed  (Billia  Grccca  Septuaginta,  fol. 
1594,  Frankfort)  was  in  existence  in  a  bookseller's  shop  at 
Cambridge  in  1812,  and  should  surely  have  been  placed 
in  some  safe  author's  museum. 

The  most  remarkable  of  Johnson's  performances  as  a 
hack  writer  deserves  a  brief  notice.  He  was  one  of  the 


28  SAMUEL  JOHNSON. 

first  of  reporters.  Cave  published  such  reports  of  the 
debates  in  Parliament  as  were  then  allowed  by  the 
jealousy  of  the  Legislature,  under  the  title  of  The  Senate 
of  Lilliput.  Johnson  was  the  author  of  the  debates  from 
Xov.  1740  to  February  1742.  Persons  were  employed  to 
attend  in  the  two  Houses,  who  brought  home  notes  of  the 
speeches,  which  were  then  put  into  shape  by  Johnson. 
Long  afterwards,  at  a  dinner  at  Foote's,  Francis  (the  father 
of  Junius)  mentioned  a  speech  of  Pitt's  as  the  best  he 
had  ever  read,  and  superior  to  anything  in  Demosthenes. 
Hereupon  Johnson  replied,  "  I  wrote  that  speech  in  a 
garret  in  Exeter  Street."  When  the  company  applauded 
not  only  his  eloquence  but  his  impartiality,  Johnson 
replied,  "That  is  not  quite  true;  I  saved  appearances 
tolerably  well,  but  I  took  care  that  the  Whig  dogs  should 
not  have  the  best  of  it."  The  speeches  passed  for  a  time 
as  accurate ;  though,  in  truth,  it  has  been  proved  and  it  k 
easy  to  observe,  that  they  are,  in  fact,  very  vague 
reflections  of  the  original.  The  editors  of  Chesterfield's 
Works  published  two  of  the  speeches,  and,  to  Johnson's 
considerable  amusement,  declared  that  one  of  them  re- 
sembled Demosthenes  and  the  other  Cicero.  It  is  plain 
enough  to  the  modern  reader  that,  if  so,  both  of  the 
ancient  orators  must  have  written  true  Johnsonese ;  and,  in 
fact,  the  style  of  the  true  author  is  often  as  plainly  marked 
in  many  of  these  compositions  as  in  the  Rambler  or 
Rasselas.  For  this  deception,  such  as  it  was,  Johnson 
expressed  penitence  at  the  end  of  his  life,  though  he  said 
that  he  had"  ceased  to  write  when  he  found  that  they  were 
taken  as  genuine.  He  would  not  be  "  accessory  to  the 
propagation  of  falsehood." 

Another  of  Johnson's  works  which  appeared  in  1744 
requires  nolice  both  for  its  intrinsic  merit,  and  its  auto- 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  29 

biographical  interest.  The  most  remarkable  of  his  Grub- 
Street  companions  was  the  Eichard  Savage  already  men- 
tioned. Johnson's  life  of  him  written  soon  after  his  death 
is  one  of  his  most  forcible  performances,  and  the  best  extant 
illustration  of  the  life  of  the  struggling  authors  of  the 
time.  Savage  claimed  to  be  the  illegitimate  son  of  the 
Countess  of  Macclesfield,  who  was  divorced  from  her  hus- 
band in  the  year  of  his  birth  on  account  of  her  connexion 
with  his  supposed  father,  Lord  Elvers.  According  to  the 
story,  believed  by  Johnson,  and  published  without  her 
contradiction  in  the  mother's  lifetime,  she  not  only  dis- 
avowed her  son,  but  cherished  an  unnatural  hatred  for 
him.  She  told  his  father  that  he  was  dead,  in  order  that 
he  might  not  be  benefited  by  the  father's  will ;  she  tried 
to  have  him  kidnapped  and  sent  to  the  plantations ;  and 
she  did  her  best  to  prevent  him  from  receiving  a  pardon 
when  he  had  been  sentenced  to  death  for  killing  a  man  in  a 
tavern  brawl.  However  this  may  be,  and  there  are  reasons 
for  doubt,  the  story  was  generally  believed,  and  caused 
much  sympathy  for  the  supposed  victim.  Savage  was  at 
one  time  protected  by  the  kindness  of  Steele,  who  published 
his  story,  and  sometimes  employed  him  as  a  literary 
assistant.  When  Steele  became  disgusted  with  him,  he 
received  generous  help  from  the  actor  Wilks  and  from  Mrs. 
Oldfield,  to  whom  he  had  been  introduced  by  some  drama- 
tic efforts.  Then  he  was  taken  up  by  Lord  Tyrconnel,  but 
abandoned  by  him  after  a  violent  quarrel ;  he  afterwards 
called  himself  a  volunteer  laureate,  and  received  a  pension 
of  501.  a  year  from  Queen  Caroline ;  on  her  death  he  was 
thrown  into  deep  distress,  and  helped  by  a  subscription 
to  which  Pope  was  the  chief  contributor,  on  condition  of 
retiring  to  the  country.  Ultimately  he  quarrelled  with  his 
last  protectors,  and  ended  by  dying  in  a  debtor's  prison. 


30  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  £CHAP. 

Various  poetical  works,  now  utterly  forgotten,  obtained 
for  him  scanty  profit.  This  career  sufficiently  reveals  the 
character.  Savage  belonged  to  the  very  common  type  of 
men,  who  seem  to  employ  their  whole  talents  to  throw  away 
their  chances  in  life,  and  to  disgust  every  one  who  offers 
them  a  helping  hand.  He  was,  however,  a  man  of  some 
talent,  though  his  poems  are  now  hopelessly  unreadable, 
and  seems  to  have  had  a  singular  attraction  for  Johnson. 
The  biography  is  curiously  marked  by  Johnson's  constant 
effort  to  put  the  best  face  upon  faults,  whrch  he  has  too 
much  love  of  truth  to  conceal.  The  explanation  is,  partly, 
that  Johnson  conceived  himself  to  be  avenging  a  victim  of 
cruel  oppression.  "  This  mother,"  he  says,  after  recording 
her  vindictiveness,  "  is  still  alive,  and  may  perhaps  even 
yet,  though  her  malice  was  often  defeated,  enjoy  the 
pleasure  of  reflecting  that  the  life,  which  she  often  endea- 
voured to  destroy,  was  at  last  shortened  by  her  maternal 
offices ;  that  though  she  could  not  transport  her  son  to  the 
plantations,  bury  him  in  the  shop  of  a  mechanic,  or  hasten 
the  hand  of  the  public  executioner,  she  has  yet  had  the 
satisfaction  of  embittering  all  his  hours,  and  forcing  him 
into  exigencies  that  hurried  on  his  death." 

But  it  is  also  probable  that  Savage  had  a  strong  influence 
upon  Johnson's  mind  at  a  very  impressible  part  of  his 
career.  The  young  man,  still  ignorant  of  life  and  full  of 
reverent  enthusiasm  for  the  literary  magnates  of  his  time, 
was  impressed  by  the  varied  experience  of  his  companion, 
and,  it  may  be,  flattered  by  his  intimacy.  Savage,  he  says 
admiringly,  had  enjoyed  great  opportunities  of  seeing  the 
most  conspicuous  men  of  the  day  in  their  private  life.  He 
was  shrewd  and  inquisitive  enough  to  use  his  opportunities 
well.  "  More  circumstances  to  constitute  a  critic  on  human 
life  could  not  easily  concur."  The  only  phrase  which  survives 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  31 

to  justify  this  remark  is  Savage's  statement  about  Walpole, 
that  "  the  whole  range  of  his  mind  was  from  obscenity  to 
politics,  and  from  politics  to  obscenity."  "We  may,  how- 
ever, guess  what  was  the  special  charm  of  the  intercourse  to 
Johnson.  Savage  was  an  expert  in  that  science  of  human 
nature,  learnt  from  experience  not  from  books,  upon  which 
Johnson  set  so  high  a  value,  and  of  which  he  was  destined 
to  become  the  authorized  expositor.  There  were,  more- 
over, resemblances  between  the  two  men.  They  were  both 
admired  and  sought  out  for  their  conversational  powers. 
Savage,  indeed,  seems  to  have  lived  chiefly  by  the  people 
who  entertained  him  for  talk,  till  he  had  disgusted  them 
by  his  insolence  and  his  utter  disregard  of  time  and  pro- 
priety. He  would,  like  Johnson,  sit  up  talking  beyond  mid- 
night, and  next  day  decline  to  rise  till  dinner-time,  though 
his  favourite  drink  was  not,  like  Johnson's,  free  from  intoxi- 
cating properties.  Both  of  them  had  a  lofty  pride,  which 
Johnson  heartily  commends  in  Savage,  though  he  has  diffi- 
culty in  palliating  some  of  its  manifestations.  One  of  the 
stories  reminds  us  of  an  anecdote  already  related  of  John- 
son himself.  Some  clothes  had  been  left  for  Savage  at  a 
coffeehouse  by  a  person  who,  out  of  delicacy,  concealed  his 
name.  Savage,  however,  resented  some  want  of  ceremony, 
and  refused  to  enter  the  house  again  till  the  clothes  had 
been  removed. 

"What  was  -honourable  pride  in  Johnson  was,  indeed, 
simple  arrogance  in  Savage.  He  asked  favours,  his  bio- 
grapher says,  without  submission,  and  resented  refusal  as 
an  insult.  He  had  too  much  pride  to  acknowledge,  not 
not  too  much  to  receive,  obligations ;  enough  to  quarrel  with 
his  charitable  benefactors,  but  not  enough  to  make  him  rise 
to  independence  of  their  charity.  His  pension  would  have 
sufficed  to  keep  him,  only  that  as  soon  as  he  received  it  ho 


82  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

retired  from  the  sight  of  all  his  acquaintance,  and  came 
back  before  long  as  penniless  as  before.  This  conduct, 
observes  his  biographer,  was  "very  particular."  It  was 
hardly  so  singular  as  objectionable ;  and  we  are  not  sur- 
prised to  be  told  that  he  was  rather  a  "  friend  of  goodness  " 
than  himself  a  good  man.  In  short,  we  may  say  of  him  as 
Beauclerk  said  of  a  friend  of  BoswelTs  that,  if  he  had  ex- 
cellent principles,  ho  did  not  wear  them  out  in  practice. 

.There  is  something  quaint  about  this  picture  of  a  tho- 
rough-paced s.camp,  admiringly  painted  by  a  virtuous  man ; 
forced,  in  spite  of  himself,  to  make  it  a  likeness,  and  striving 
in  vain  to  make  it  attractive.  I3ut  it  is  also  pathetic  when 
we  remember  that  Johnson  shared  some  part  at  least  of  his 
hero's  miseries.  "  On  a  bulk,  in  a  cellar,  or  in  a  glass-house, 
among  thieves  and  beggars,  was  to  be  found  the  author  of 
The  Wanderer,  the  man  of  exalted  sentiments,  extensive 
views,  and  curious  observations ;  the  man  whose  remarks 
on  life  might  have  assisted  the  statesman,  whose  ideas  of 
virtue  might  have  enlightened  the  moralist,  whose  elo- 
quence might  have  influenced  senators,  and  whose  delicacy 
might  have  polished  courts."  Very  shocking,  no  doubt, 
and  yet  hardly  surprising  under  the  circumstances  !  To 
us  it  is  more  interesting  to  remember  that  the  author  of 
the  Rambler  was  not  only  a  sympathizer,  but  a  fellow- 
sufferer  with  the  author  of  the  Wanderer,  and  shared 
the  queer  "  lodgings  "  of  his  friend,  as  Floyd  shared  the 
lodgings  of  Derrick.  Johnson  happily  came  unscathed 
through  the  ordeal  which  was  too  much  for  poor 
Savage,  and  could  boast  with  perfect  truth  in  later  life 
that  "  no  man,  who  ever  lived  by  literature,  had  lived 
more  independently  than  I  have  done."  It  was  in  so 
strange  a  school,  and  under  such  questionable  teaching  that 
Johnson  formed  his  character  of  the  world  and  of  the  con- 


«.]  LITEEAEY  CAREER.  33 

duct  befitting  its  inmates.  One  characteristic  conclusion 
is  indicated  in  the  opening  passage  of  the  life.  It  has 
always  been  observed,  he  says,  that  men  eminent  by  nature 
or  fortune  are  not  generally  happy :  "  whether  it  be  that 
apparent  superiority  incites  great  designs,  and  great  designs 
are  naturally  liable  to  fatal  miscarriages ;  or  that  the  general 
lot  of  mankind  is  misery,  and  the  misfortunes  of  those, 
whose  eminence  drew  upon  them  an  universal  attention, 
have  been  more  carefully  recorded  because  they  w<?re  more 
generally  Observed,  and  have  in  reality  been  only  more 
conspicuous  than  those  of  others,  not  more  frequent  or 
more  severe." 

The  last  explanation  was  that  which  really  commended 
itself  to  Johnson.  Nobody  had  better  reason  to  know 
that  obscurity  might  conceal  a  misery  as  bitter  as  any  that 
fell  to  the  lot  of  the  most  eminent.  The  gloom  due  to  his 
constitutional  temperament  was  intensified  by  the  sense  that 
he  and  his  wife  were  dependent  upon  the  goodwill  of  a  nar- 
row and  ignorant  tradesman  for  the  scantiest  maintenance. 
How  was  he  to  reach  some  solid  standing-ground  above  the 
hopeless  mire  of  Grub  Street  ?  As  a  journeyman  author 
he  could  make  both  ends  meet,  but  only  on  condition  of 
incessant  labour.  Illness  and  misfortune  would  mean 
constant  dependence  upon  charity  or  bondage  to  creditors. 
To  get  ahead  of  the  world  it  was  necessary  to  distinguish 
himself  in  some  way  from  the  herd  of  needy  competitors. 
He  had  come  up  from  Lichfield  with  a  play  in  his  pocket, 
but  the  play  did  not  seem  at  present  to  have  much  chance 
of  emerging.  Meanwhile  he  published  a  poem  which  did 
something  to  give  him  a  general  reputation. 

London — an  imitation  of  the  Third  Satire  of  Juvenal — 
was  published  in  May,  1738.  The  plan  was  doubtless 
suggested  by  Pope's  imitations  of  Horace,  which  had 


84  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

recently  appeared.  Though  necessarily  following  the  lines 
of  Juvenal's  poem,  and  conforming  to  the  conventional 
fashion  of  the  time,  both  in  sentiment  and  versification, 
the  poem  has  a  biographical  significance.  It  is  indeed 
odd  to  find  Johnson,  who  afterwards  thought  of  London 
as  a  lover  of  his  mistress,  and  who  despised  nothing  more 
heartily  than  the  cant  of  Rousseau  and  the  sentimentalists, 
adopting  in  this  poem  the  ordinary  denunciations  of  the 
corruption  of  towns,  and  singing  the  praises  of  an  innocent 
country  life.  Doubtless,  the  young  writer  was  like  other 
young  men,  taking  up  a  strain  still  imitative  and  artificial. 
He  has  a  quiet  smile  at  Savage  in  the  life,  because  in  his 
retreat  to  Wales,  that  enthusiast  declared  that  he  "  could 
not  debar  himself  from  the  happiness  which  was  to  be 
found  in  the  calm  of  a  cottage,  or  lose  the  opportunity 
of  listening  without  intermission  to  the  melody  of  the 
nightingale,  which  he  believed  was  to  be  heard  from  every 
bramble,  and  which  he  did  not  fail  to  mention  as  a  very 
important -part  of  the  happiness  of  a  country  life."  In 
London,  this  insincere  cockney  adopts  Savage's  view. 
Thales,  who  is  generally  supposed  to  represent  Savage  (and 
this  coincidence  seems  to  confirm  the  opinion),  is  to  retire 
"  from  tKe  dungeons  of  the  Strand,"  and  to  end  a  healthy 
life  in  pruning  walks  and  twining  bowers  in  his  garden. 

There  every  bash  with  nature's  music  rings, 
There  every  breeze  bears  health  upon  its  wings. 

Johnson  had  not  yet  learnt  the  value  of  perfect  sincerity 
even  in  poetry.  But  it  must  also  be  admitted  that  London, 
as  seen  by  the  poor  drudge  from  a  Grub  Street  garret,  pro- 
bably presented  a  prospect  gloomy  enough  to  make  even 
Johnson  long  at  times  for  rural  solitude.  The  poem  reflects, 
too,  the  ordinary  talk  of  the  heterogeneous  band  of  patriots, 


m]  LITERARY  CAREER.  35 

Jacobites,  and  disappointed  "Whigs,  who  were  beginning 
to  gather  enough  strength  to  threaten  Walpole's  long 
tenure  of  power.  Many  references  fo  contemporary  politics 
illustrate  Johnson's  sympathy  with  the  inhabitants  of  the 
contemporary  Cave  of  Adullam. 

This  poem,  as  already  stated,  attracted  Pope's  notice, 
who  made  a  curious  note  on  a  scrap  of  paper  sent  with  it 
to  a  friend.  Johnson  is  described  as  "  a  man  afflicted  with 
an  infirmity  of  the  convulsive  kind,  that  attacks  him  some- 
tunes  so  as  to  make  him  a  sad  spectacle."  This  seems  to 
have  been  the  chief  information  obtained  by  Pope  about 
the  anonymous  author,  of  whom  he  had  said,  on  first  read- 
ing the  poem,  this  man  will  soon  be  deterre.  London  made 
a  certain  noise  ;  it  reached  a  second  edition  in  a  week,  and 
attracted  various  patrons,  among  others,  General  Ogle- 
thorpe,  celebrated  by  Pope,  and  through  a  long  life  the 
warm  friend  of  Johnson.  One  line,  however,  in  the  poem 
printed  in  capital  letters,  gives  the  moral  which  was  doubt- 
less most  deeply  felt  by  the  author,  and  which  did  not 
lose  its  meaning  in  the  years  to  come.  This  mournful 
truth,  he  says, — 

Is  everywhere  confess'd, 
Slow  rises  worth  by  poverty  depress'd. 

Ten  years  later  (in  January,  1749)  appeared  the  Vanity  of 
Human  Wishes,  an  imitation  of  the  Tenth  Satire  of  Juvenal. 
The  difference  in  tone  shows  how  deeply  this  and  similar 
truths  had  been  impressed  upon  its  author  in  the  interval. 
Though  still  an  imitation,  it  is  as  significant  as  the  most 
original  work  could  be  of  Johnson's  settled  views  of  life. 
It  was  written  at  a  white  heat,  as  indeed  Johnson  wrote 
all  his  best  work.  Its  strong  Stoical  morality,  its  profound 
and  melancholy  illustrations  of  the  old  and  ever  new  sen- 


36  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHJBP. 

timent,  Vanitas  Vanitatum,  make  it  perhaps  the  most 
impressive  poem  of  the  kind  in  the  language.  The  lines 
on  the  scholar's  fate  show  that  the  iron  had  entered  his 
soul  in  the  interval.  Should  the  scholar  succeed  beyond 
expectation  in  his  labours  and  escape  melancholy  and 
disease,  yet,  he  says, — 

Yet  hope  not  life  from  grief  and  danger  free, 
Nor  think  the  doom  of  man  reversed  on  thee  ; 
Deign  on  the  passing  world  to  turn  thine  eyes 
And  pause  awhile  from  letters,  to  be  wise  ; 
There  mark  what  ills  the  scholar's  life  assail, 
Toil,  envy,  want,  the  patron  and  the  jail  ; 
See  nations,  slowly  wise  and  meanly  just, 
To  buried  merit  raise  the  tardy  bust. 
If  dreams  yet  flatter,  once  again  attend. 
Hear  Lydiat's  life  and  Galileo's  end. 

For  the  "  patron,"  Johnson  had  originally  written  the 
"garret."  The  change  was  made  after  an  experience  of 
patronage  to  be  presently  described  in  connexion  with 
the  Dictionary. 

For  London  Johnson  received  ten  guineas,  and  for  the 
Vanity  of  Human  Wishes  fifteen.  Though  indirectly 
valuable,  as  increasing  his  reputation,  such  work  was  not 
very  profitable.  The  most  promising  career  in  a  pecuniary 
sense  was  still  to  be  found  on  the  stage.  Novelists  were 
not  yet  the  rivals  of  dramatists,  and  many  authors  had 
made  enough  by  a  successful  play  to  float  them  through  a 
year  or  two.  Johnson  had  probably  been  determined  by 
his  knowledge  of  this  fact  to  write  the  tragedy  of  Irene. 
No  other  excuse  at  least  can  be  given  for  the  composition 
of  one  of  the  heaviest  and  most  unreadable  of  dramatic 
performances,  interesting  now,  if  interesting  at  all,  solely 
as  a  curious  example  of  the  result  of  bestowing  great 
powers  upon  a  totally  uncongenial  task.  Young  men, 


II.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  37 

however,  may  be  pardoned  for  such,  blunders  if  they  are 
not  repeated,  and  Johnson,  though  he  seems  to  have 
retained  a  fondness  for  his  unlucky  performance,  never 
indulged  in  playwriting  after  leaving  Lichfield.  The  best 
thing  connected  with  the  play  was  Johnson's  retort  to  his 
friend  Walmsley,  the  Lichfield  registrar.  "  How,"  asked 
Walmsley,  "  can  you  contrive  to  plunge  your  heroine  into 
deeper  calamity  ? "  "  Sir,"  said  Johnson,  "  I  can  put  her 
into  the  spiritual  court."  Even  Boswell  can  only  say  for 
Irene  that  it  is  "entitled  to  the  praise  of  superior  ex- 
cellence," and  admits  its  entire  absence  of  dramatic  power. 
Garrick,  who  had  become  manager  of  Drury  Lane,  pro- 
duced his  friend's  work  in  1749.  The  play  was  carried 
through  nine  nights  by  Garrick's  friendly  zeal,  so  that  the 
author  had  his  three  nights'  profits.  For  this  he  received 
£195  17s.  and  for  the  copy  he  had  £100.  People  pro- 
bably attended,  as  they  attend  modern  representations  of 
legitimate  drama,  rather  from  a  sense  of  duty,  than  in  the 
hope  of  pleasure.  The  heroine  originally  had  to  speak 
two  lines  with  a  bowstring  round  her  neck.  The  situation 
produced  cries  of  murder,  and  she  had  to  go  off  the  stage 
alive.  The  objectionable  passage  was  removed,  but  Irene 
was  on  the  whole  a  failure,  and  has  never,  I  imagine, 
made  another  appearance.  "When  asked  ho  who  felt  upon 
his  ill-success,  he  replied  "  like  the  monument,"  and  indeed 
he  made  it  a  principle  throughout  life  to  accept  the  de- 
cision of  the  public  like  a  sensible  man  without  murmurs. 
Meanwhile,  Johnson  was  already  embarked  upon  an 
undertaking  of  a  very  different  kind.  In  1747  he  had 
put  forth  a  plan  for  an  English  Dictionary,  addressed 
at  the  suggestion  of  Dodsley,  to  Lord  Chesterfield,  then 
Secretary  of  State,  and  the  great  contemporary  Maecenas. 
Johnson  had  apparently  been  maturing  the  scheme  for 


38  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

some  time.  "  I  know,"  he  says  in  the  "  plan,"  that  "  the 
work  in  which  I  engaged  is  generally  considered  as 
drudgery  for  the  blind,  as  the  proper  toil  of  artless 
industry,  a  book  that  requires  neither  the  light  of  learning 
nor  the  activity  of  genius,  but  may  be  successfully  per- 
formed without  any  higher  quality  than  that  of  bearing 
burdens  with  dull  patience,  and  beating  the  track  of  the 
alphabet  with  sluggish  resolution."  He  adds  in  a  sub- 
sarcastic  tone,  that  although  princes  and  statesmen  had 
once  thought  it  honourable  to  patronize  dictionaries,  he  had 
considered  such  benevolent  acts  to  be  "  prodigies,  recorded 
rather  to  raise  wonder  than  expectation,"  and  he  was  ac- 
cordingly pleased  and  surprised  to  find  that  Chesterfield 
took  an  interest  in  his  undertaking.  He  proceeds  to  lay 
down  the  general  principles  upon  which  he  intends  to 
frame  his  work,  in  order  to  invite  timely  suggestions  and 
repress  unreasonable  expectations.  At  this  time,  humble 
as  his  aspirations  might  be,  he  took  a  view  of  the  possi- 
bilities open  to  him  Avhich  had  to  be  lowered  before  the 
publication  of  the  dictionary.  He  shared  the  illusion 
that  a  language  might  be  "  fixed  "  by  making  a  catalogue 
of  its  words.  In  the  preface  which  appeared  with  the 
completed  work,  he  explains  very  sensibly  the  vanity  of 
any  such  expectation.  Whilst  all  human  affairs  are 
changing,  it  is,  as  he  says,  absurd  to  imagine  that  the 
language  which  repeats  all  human  thoughts  and  feelings 
can  remain  unaltered. 

A  die  tionary,  as  Johnson  conceived  it,  was  in  fact  work 

for  a  "  harmless  drudge,"  the  definition  of  a  lexicographer 

given  in  the  book  itself.     Etymology  in  a  scientific  sense 

was  as  yet  non-existent,  and  Johnson  was  not  in  this  re- 

;  spect  ahead  of  his  contemporaries.    To  collect  all  the  words 

•  in  the  language,  to  define  their  meanings  as  accurately  aa 


H.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  39 

might  be,  to  give  the  obvious  or  whimsical  guesses  at 
Etymology  suggested  by  previous  writers,  and  to  append  a 
good  collection  of  illustrative  passages  was  the  sum  of  his 
ambition.  Any  systematic  training  of  the  historical  pro- 
cesses by  which  a  particular  language  had  been  developed 
was  unknown,  and  of  course  the  result  could  not  be 
anticipated.  The  work,  indeed,  required  a  keen  logical 
faculty  of  definition,  and  wide  reading  of  the  English 
literature  of  the  two  preceding  centuries ;  but  it  could  of 
course  give  no  play  either  for  the  higher  literary  faculties 
on  points  of  scientific  investigation.  A  dictionary  in 
Johnson's  sense  was  the  highest  kind  of  work  to  which  a 
literary  journeyman  could  be  set,  but  it  was  still  work  for 
a  journeyman,  not  for  an  artist.  He  was  not  adding  to 
literature,  but  providing  a  useful  implement  for  future 
men  of  letters. 

Johnson  had  thus  got  on  hand  the  biggest  job  that 
could  be  well  undertaken  by  a  good  workman  in  his 
humble  craft.  He  was  to  receive  fifteen  hundred  and 
seventy-five  pounds  for  the  whole,  and  he  expected  to 
finish  it  in  three  years.  The  money,  it  is  to  be  observed, 
was  to  satisfy  not  only  Johnson  but  several  copyists 
employed  in  the  mechanical  part  of  the  work.  It  was 
advanced  by  instalments,  and  came  to  an  end  before  the 
conclusion  of  the  book.  Indeed,  it  appeared  when 
accounts  were  settled,  that  he  had  received  a  hundred 
pounds  more  than  was  due.  He  could,  however,  pay  his 
way  for  the  time,  and  would  gain  a  reputation  enough  to 
ensure  work  in  future.  The  period  of  extreme  poverty 
had  probably  ended  when  Johnson  got  permanent  employ- 
ment on  the  Gentleman's  Magazine.  He  was  not  elevated 
above  the  need  of  drudgery  and  economy,  but  he  might 
at  least  bo  free  from  the  dread  of  neglect.  He  could 


40  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

command  his  market — such  as  it  was.  The  necessity  of 
eteady  labour  was  probably  unfelt  in  repelling  his  fits  of 
melancholy.  His  name  was  beginning  to  be  known,  and 
men  of  reputation  were  seeking  his  acquaintance.  In  the 
winter  of  1749  he  formed  a  club,  which  met  weekly  at  a 
"famous  beef-steak  house"  in  Ivy  Lane.  Among  its 
members  were  Hawkins,  afterwards  his  biographer,  and 
two  friends,  Bathurst  a  physician,  and  Hawkesworth  an 
author,  for  the  first  of  whom  he  entertained  an  unusually 
strong  affection.  The  Club,  like  its  more  famous  successor, 
gave  Johnson  an  opportunity  of  displaying  and  improving 
his  great  conversational  powers.  He  was  already  dreaded 
for  his  prowess  in  argument,  his  dictatorial  manners  and 
vivid  flashes  of  wit  and  humour,  the  more  effective  from 
the  habitual  gloom  and  apparent  heaviness  of  the  dis- 
courser. 

The  talk  of  this  society  probably  suggested  topics  for 
the  Rambler,  which  appeared  at  this  time,  and  caused 
Johnson's  fame  to  spread  further  beyond  the  literary  circles 
of  London.  The  wit  and  humour  have,  indeed,  left  few 
traces  upon  its  ponderous  pages,  for  the  Rambler  marks 
the  culminating  period  of  Johnson's  worst  qualities  of 
style.  The  pompous  and  involved  language  seems  indeed  to 
be  a  fit  clothing  for  the  melancholy  reflections  which  are 
its  chief  staple,  and  in  spite  of  its  unmistakable  power  it  is 
as  heavy  reading  as  the  heavy  class  of  lay-sermonizing  to 
which  it  belongs.  Such  literature,  however,  is  often 
strangely  popular  in  England,  and  the  Rambler,  though 
its  circulation  was  limited,  gave  to  Johnson  his  position 
as  a  great  practical  moralist.  He  took  his  literary  title, 
one  may  say,  from  the  Rambler,  as  the  more  familiar  title 
was  derived  from  the  Dictionary. 

The  Rambler  was  published  twice  a  week  from  March 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER,  41 

20th,  1750,  to  March  14th,  1752.  In  five  numbers  alone 
lie  received  assistance  from  friends,  and  one  of  these, 
written  by  Eichardson,  is  said  to  have  been  the  only 
number  which,  had  a  large  sale.  The  circulation  rarely 
exceeded  500,  though  ten  English  editions  were  published 
in  the  author's  lifetime,  besides  Scotch  and  Irish  editions. 
The  payment,  however,  namely,  two  guineas  a  number, 
must  have  been  welcome  to  Johnson,  and  the  friendship 
of  many  distinguished  men  of  the  time  was  a  still  more 
valuable  reward.  A  quaint  story  illustrates  the  hero- 
worship  of  which  Johnson  now  became  the  object.  Dr. 
Burney,  afterwards  an  intimate  friend,  had  introduced 
himself  to  Johnson  by  letter  in  consequence  of  the  Rambler, 
and  the  plan  of  the  Dictionary.  The  admiration  was 
shared  by  a  friend  of  Burney's,  a  Mr.  Bewley,  known— in 
Norfolk  at  least — as  the  "  philosopher  of  Massingham." 
When  Burney  at  last  gained  the  honour  of  a  personal 
interview,  he  wished  to  procure  some  "  relic  "  of  Johnson 
for  his  friend.  He  cut  off  some  bristles  from  a  hearth- 
broom  in  the  doctor's  chambers,  and  sent  them  in  a  letter 
to  his  fellow-enthusiast.  Long  afterwards  Johnson  was 
pleased  to  hear  of  this  simple-minded  homage,  and  not 
only  sent  a  copy  of  the  Lives  of  the  Poets  to  the  rural  phi- 
losopher, but  deigned  to  grant  him  a  personal  interview. 

Dearer  than  any  such  praise  was  the  approval  of  John- 
son's wife.  She  told  him  that,  well  as  she  had  thought  of 
him  before,  she  had  not  considered  him  equal  to  such  a 
performance.  The  voice  that  so  charmed  him  was  soon  to 
be  silenced  for  ever.  Mrs.  Johnson  died  (March  17th, 
1752)  three  days  after  the  appearance  of  the  last  Rambler. 
The  man  who  has  passed  through  such  a  trial  knows  well 
that,  whatever  may  be  in  store  for  him  in  the  dark  future, 
fate  can  have  no  heavier  blow  in  reserve.  Though  John- 
3 


42  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

son  once  acknowledged  to  Boswell,  when  in  a  placid 
humour,  that  happier  days  had  come  to  him  in  his  old  age 
than  in  his  early  life,  he  would  probably  have  added  that 
though  fame  and  friendship  and  freedom  from  the  har- 
rowing cares  of  poverty  might  cause  his  life  to  be  more 
equably  happy,  yet  their  rewards  could  represent  but  a 
faint  and  mocking  reflection  of  the  best  moments  of  a  happy 
marriage.  His  strong  mind  and  tender  nature  reeled 
under  the  blow.  Here  is  one  pathetic  little  note  written 
to  the  friend,  Dr.  Taylor,  who  had  come  to  him  in  his 
distress.  That  which  first  announced  the  calamity,  and 
which,  said  Taylor,  "  expressed  grief  in  the  strongest 
manner  he  had  ever  read,"  is  lost. 

"Dear  Sir, — Let  me  have  your  company  and  instruc- 
tion. Do  not  live  away  from  me.  My  distress  is  great. 

"  Pray  desire  Mi's.  Taylor  to  inform  me  what  mourning 
I  should  buy  for  my  mother  and  Miss  Porter,  and  bring  a 
note  in  writing  with  you. 

"  Remember  me  in  your  prayers,  for  vain  is  the  help  of 
man. 

"  I  am,  dear  sir, 

"  SAM.  JOHNSON." 

We  need  not  regret  that  a  veil  is  drawn  over  the  details 
of  the  bitter  agony  of  his  passage  through  the  valley  of 
the  shadow  of  death.  It  is  enough  to  put  down  the 
wails  which  he  wrote  long  afterwards  when  visibly  ap- 
proaching the  close  of  all  human  emotions  and  interests  : — 

"This  is  the  day  on  which,  in  1752,  dear  Letty  died. 
I  have  now  uttered  a  prayer  of  repentance  and  contrition ; 
perhaps  Letty  knows  that  I  prayed  for  her.  Perhaps  Letty 
is  now  praying  for  me.  God  help  me.  Thou,  God,  art 
merciful,  hear  my  prayers  and  enable  me  to  trust  in  Thee. 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  43 

"  We  were  married  almost  seventeen  years,  and  Lave 
now  been  parted  thirty." 

It  seems  half  profane,  even  at  this  distance  of  time,  to 
pry  into  grief  so  deep  and  so  lasting.  Johnson  turned  for 
relief  to  that  which  all  sufferers  know  to  be  the  only  remedy 
for  sorrow — hard  labour.  He  set  to  work  in  his  garret,  an 
inconvenient  room,  "  because,"  he  said,  "  in  that  room  only 
I  never  saw  Mrs.  Johnson."  He  helped  his  friend  Hawkes- 
worth  in  the  Adventurer,  a  new  periodical  of  the  Rambler 
kind ;  but  his  main  work  was  the  Dictionary,  which  came 
out  at  last  in  1755.  Its  appearance  was  the  occasion  of 
an  explosion  of  wrath  which  marks  an  epoch  in  our  litera- 
ture. Johnson,  as  we  have  seen,  had  dedicated  the  Plan 
to  Lord  Chesterfield ;  and  his  language  implies  that  they 
had  been  to  some  extent  in  personal  communication.  Ches- 
terfield's fame  is  in  curious  antithesis  to  Johnson's.  He 
was  a  man  of  great  abilities,  and  seems  to  have  deserved 
high  credit  for  some  parts  of  his  statesmanship.  As  a 
Viceroy  in  Ireland  in  particular  he  showed  qualities  rare 
in  his  generation.  To  Johnson  he  was  known  as  the 
nobleman  who  had  a  wide  social  influence  as  an  acknow- 
ledged arbiter  elegantiarum,  and  who  reckoned  among 
his  claims  some  of  that  literary  polish  in  which  the  earlier 
generation  of  nobles  had  certainly  been  superior  to  their 
successors.  The  art  of  life  expounded  in  his  Letters 
differs  from  Johnson  as  much  as  the  elegant  diplomatist 
differs  from  the  rough  intellectual  gladiator  of  Grub  Street. 
Johnson  spoke  his  mind  of  his  rival  without  reserve.  "  I 
thought,"  he  said,  "  that  this  man  had  been  a  Lord  among 
wits ;  but  I  find  he  is  only  a  wit  among  Lords."  And  of 
the  Letters  he  said  more  keenly  that  they  taught  the  morals 
of  a  harlot  and  the  manners  of  a  dancing-master.  Chester- 
field's opinion  of  Johnson  is  indicated  by  the  description 


44  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAT. 

in  his  Letters  of  a  "respectable  Hottentot,  -who  throws 
his  meat  anywhere  bub  down  his  throat.  This  absurd 
person,"  said  Chesterfield,  "  was  not  only  uncouth  in  man- 
ners and  warm  in  dispute,  but  behaved  exactly  in  the 
same  way  to  superiors,  equals,  and  inferiors ;  and  there- 
fore, by  a  necessary  consequence,  absurdly  to  two  of  the 
three.  Hinc  iUce  lacrynwe  !  " 

Johnson,  in  my  opinion,  was  not  far  wrong  in  his  judg- 
ment, though  it  would  be  a  gross  injustice  to  regard  Ches- 
terfield as  nothing  but  a  fribble.  But  men  representing 
two  such  antithetic  types  were  not  likely  to  admire  each 
other's  good  qualities.  Whatever  had  been  the  intercourse 
between  them,  Johnson  was  naturally  annoyed  when  the 
dignified  noble  published  two  articles  in  the  World — a 
periodical  supported  by  such  polite  personages  as  himself 
and  Horace  Walpole — in  which  the  need  of  a  dictionary 
was  set  forth,  and  various  courtly  compliments  described 
Johnson's  fitness  for  a  dictatorship  over  the  language. 
Nothing  could  be  more  prettily  turned ;  but  it  meant,  and 
Johnson  took  it  to  mean,  I  should  like  to  have  the  dic- 
tionary dedicated  to  me  :  such  a  compliment  would  add 
a  feather  to  my  cap,  and  enable  me  to  appear  to  the  world 
as"  a  patron  of  literature  as  well  as  an  authority  upon  man- 
ners. "After  making  great  professions,"  as  Johnson  said, 
"  he  had,  for  many  years,  taken  no  notice  of  me  ;  but  when 
my  Dictionary  was  coming  out,  he  fell  a  scribbling  in  the 
World  about  it."  Johnson  therefore  bestowed  upon  the 
noble  earl  a  piece  of  his  mind  in  a  letter  which  was  not 
published  till  it  came  out  in  Boswell's  biography. 

"  My  Lord, — I  have  been  lately  informed  by  the  pro- 
prietor of  the  World  that  two  papers,  in  which  my  Dic- 
tionary is  recommended  to  the  public,  were  written  by 
your  lordship.  To  be  so  distinguished  is  an  honour 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  45 

which,  being  very  little  accustomed  to  favours  from  the 
great,  I  know  not  well  how  to  receive,  or  in  what  terms  to 
•acknowledge. 

"  When,  upon  some  slight  encouragement,  I  first  visited 
your  Lordship,  I  was  overpowered,  like  the  rest  of  man- 
kind, by  the  enchantment  of  your  address  ;  and  could  not 
forbear  to  wish  that  I  might  boast  myself,  le  vainqucur 
du  vainqueur  de  la  terre — that  I  might  obtain  that  regard 
for  which  I  saw  the  world  contending ;  but  I  found  my 
attendance  so  little  encouraged  that  neither  pride  nor 
modesty  would  suffer  me  to  continue  it.  When  I  had 
once  addressed  your  Lordship  in  public,  I  had  exhausted 
all  the  arts  of  pleasing  which  a  wearied  and  uncourtly 
scholar  can  possess.  I  had  done  all  that  I  could ;  and  no 
man  is  well  pleased  to  have  his  all  neglected,  be  it  ever 
so  little. 

"  Seven  years,  my  lord,  have  now  passed,  since  I  waited 
in  your  outward  rooms  and  was  repulsed  from  your  door ; 
during  which  time  I  have  been  pushing  on  my  work 
through  difficulties  of  which  it  is  useless  to  complain,  and 
have  brought  it  at  last  to  the  verge  of  publication  without 
one  act  of  assistance,  one  word  of  encouragement,  or  one 
smile  of  favour.  Such  treatment  I  did  not  expect,  for  I 
never  had  a  patron  before. 

"  The  shepherd  in  Virgil  grew  at  last  acquainted  with 
Love,  and  found  him  a  native  of  the  rocks. 

"  Is  not  a  patron,  my  Lord,  one  who  looks  with  uncon- 
cern on  a  man  struggling  for  life  in  the  water,  and  when 
he  has  reached  the  ground  encumbers  him  with  help  ? 
The  notice  which  you  have  been  pleased  to  take  of  my 
labours,  had  it  been  early,  had  been  kind ;  but  it  has  been 
delayed  till  I  am  indifferent,  and  cannot  enjoy  it ;  till  I 
am  solitary,  and  cannot  impart  it ;  till  I  am  known,  and 


46  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

do  not  want  it.     I  hope  it  is  no  very  cynical  asperity  not 
to  confess  obligations  where  no  benefit  has  been  received, 
or  to  be  unwilling  that  the  public  should  consider  me  as  • 
owing  that  to  a  patron  which  Providence  has  enabled  me 
to  do  for  myself. 

"  Having  carried  on  my  work  thus  far  with  so  little 
obligation  to  any  favourer  of  learning,  I  shall  not  be  dis- 
appointed though  I  should  conclude  it,  should  less  be 
possible,  with  less ;  for  I  have  been  long  wakened  from 
that  dream  of  hope  in  which  I  once  boasted  myself  with 
so  much  exultation,  my  Lord, 

"  Your  Lordship's  most  humble,  most  obedient  servant, 

"  SAM.  JOHNSON." 

The  letter  is  one  of  those  knock-down  blows  to  which 
no  answer  is  possible,  and  upon  which  comment  is  super- 
fluous. It  was,  as  Mr.  Carlyle  calls  it,  "  the  far-famed 
blast  of  doom  proclaiming  into  the  ear  of  Lord  Chester- 
field and  through  him,  of  the  listening  world,  that  patron- 
age should  be  no  more/" 

That  is  all  that  can  Lo  said  ;  yet  perhaps  it  should  be 
added  that  Johnson  remarked  that  he  had  once  received 
£10  from  Chesterfield,  though  he  thought  the  assistance 
too  inconsiderable  to  be  mentioned  in  such  a  letter.  Haw- 
kins also  states  that  Chesterfield  sent  overtures  to  Johnson 
through  two  friends,  one  of  whom,  long  Sir  Thomas  Eo- 
binson,  stated  that,  if  he  were  rich  enough  (a  judicious 
clause)  he  would  himself  settle  £500  a  year  upon  Johnson. 
Johnson  replied  that  if  the  first  peer  of  the  realm  made 
such  an  offer,  he  would  show  him  the  way  downstairs. 
Hawkins  is  startled  at  this  insolence,  and  at  Johnson's 
uniform  assertion  that  an  offer  of  money  was  an  insult.  We 
cannot  tell  what  was  the  history  of  the  £10  ;  but  Johnson, 
in  spite  of  Hawkins's  righteous  indignation,  was  in  fact  too 


il.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  47 

proud  to  be  a  beggar,  and  owed  to  his  pride  his  escape 
from  the  fate  of  Savage. 

The  appearance  of  the  Dictionary  placed  Johnson  in  the 
position  described  soon  afterwards  by  Smollett.  He  was 
henceforth  "  the  great  Cham  of  Literature" — a  monarch 
sitting  in  the  chair  previously  occupied  by  his  namesake, 
Ben,  by  Dryden,  and  by  Pope  ;  but  which  has  since  that 
time  been  vacant.  The  world  of  literature  has  become  too 
large  for  such  authority.  Complaints  were  not  seldom 
uttered  at  the  time.  Goldsmith  has,  urged  that  Boswell 
wished  to  make  a  monarchy  of  what  ought  to  be  a  republic. 
Goldsmith,  who  would  have  been  the  last  man  to  find 
serious  fault  with  the  dictator,  thought  the  dictatorship 
objectionable.  Some  time  indeed  was  still  to  elapse  before 
we  can  say  that  Johnson  was  firmly  seated  on  the  throne  ; 
but  the  Dictionary  and  the  Rambler  had  given  him  a 
position  not  altogether  easy  to  appreciate,  now  that  the 
Dictionary  has  been  superseded  and  the  Rambler  gone  out 
of  fashion.  His  name  was  the  highest  at  this  time  (1755) 
in  the  ranks  of  pure  literature.  The  fame  of  Warburton 
possibly  bulked^  larger  for  the  moment,  and  one  of  his 
flatterers  was  comparing  him  to  the  Colossus  which  be- 
strides i^ie  petty  world  of  contemporaries.  But  Warburton 
had  subsided  into  episcopal  repose,  and  literature  had  been 
for  him  a  stepping-stone  rather  than  an  ultimate  aim. 
Hume  had  written  works  of  far  more  enduring  influence 
than  Johnson  ;  but  they  were  little  read  though  generally 
abused,  and  scarcely  belong  to  the  purely  literary  history. 
The  first  volume  of  his  History  of  England  had  appeared 
(1754),  but  had  not  succeeded.  The  second  was  just  coming 
out.  Richardson  was  still  giving  laws  to  his  little  seraglio 
of  adoring  women;  Fielding  had  died  (1754),  worn  out  by 
labour  and  dissipation ;  Smollett  was  active  in  the  literary 


48  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

trade,  but  not  in  such  a  way  as  to  increase  his  own  dignity 
or  that  of  his  employment ;  Gray  was  slowly  writing  a  few 
lines  of  exquisite  verse  in  his  retirement  at  Cambridge ; 
two  young  Irish  adventurers,  Burke  and  Goldsmith,  were 
just  coming  to  London  to  try  their  fortune ;  Adam  Smith 
made  his  first  experiment  as  an  author  by  reviewing  the 
Dictionary  in  the  Edinburgh  Review  ;  Eobertson  had  not 
yet  appeared  as  a  historian ;  Gibbon  was  at  Lausanne 
repenting  of  his  old  brief  lapse  into  Catholicism  as  an  act 
of  undergraduate's  folly ;  and  Cowper,  after  three  years  of 
"  gigS^S  anc^  making  giggle"  with  Thurlow  in  an  attor- 
ney's office,  was  now  entered  at  the  Temple  and  amusing 
himself  at  times  with  literature  in  company  with  such 
small  men  of  letters  as  Colman,  Bonnell  Thornton,  and 
Lloyd.  It  was  a  slack  tide  of  literature  ;  the  generation 
of  Pope  had  passed  away  and  left  no  successors,  and  no 
writer  of  the  time  could  be  put  in  competition  with  the 
giant  now  known  as  "  Dictionary  Johnson." 

When  the  last  sheet  of  the  Dictionary  had  been  carried 
to  the  publisher,  Millar,  Johnson  asked  the  messenger, 
""What  did  he  say]"  "  Sir,"  said  the  messenger,  "he 
said,  '  Thank  God  I  have  done  with  him.' "  "  I  am  glad," 
replied  Johnson,  "that  he  thanks  God  for  anything." 
Thankfulness  for  relief  from  seven  years'  toil  seems  to  have 
been  Johnson's  predominant  feeling :  and  he  was  not 
anxious  for  a  time  to  take  any  new  labours  tfpon  his  shoul- 
ders. Some  years  passed  which  have  left  few  traces  either 
upon  his  personal  or  his  literary  history.  He  contributed  a 
good  many  reviews  in  175G-7  to  the  Literary  Magazine, 
one  of  which,  a  review  of  Soame  Jenyns,  is  amongst  his 
best  performances.  To  a  weekly  paper  he  contributed  for 
two  years,  from  April,  1758,  to  April,  1760,  a  set  of  essays 
called  the  Idler,  on  the  old  RamUer  plan.  He  did  some 


H.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  49 

small  literary  cobbler's  work,  receiving  a  guinea  for  a 
prospectus  to  a  newspaper  and  ten  pounds  for  correcting  a 
volume  of  poetry.  He  had  advertised  in  1756  a  new 
edition  of  Shakspeare  which  was  to  appear  by  Christmas, 
1757  :  but  he  dawdled  over  it  so  unconscionably  that  it 
did  not  appear  for  nine  years ;  and  then  only  in  conse- 
quence of  taunts  from  Churchill,  who  accused  him  with 
too  much  plausibility  of  cheating  his  subscribers. 

He  for  subscribers  baits  his  hook ; 

And  takes  your  cash  :  but  where's  the  book  ? 

No  matter  where  ;  wise  fear,  you  know 

Forbids  the  robbing  of  a  foe ; 

But  what  to  serve  our  private  ends 

Forbids  the  cheating  of  our  friends  ? 

In  truth,  his  constitutional  indolence  seems  to  have 
gained  advantages  over  him,  when  the  stimulus  of  a  heavy 
task  was  removed.  In  his  meditations,  there  are  many 
complaints  of  his  "  sluggishness "  and  resolutions  of 
amendment.  "A  kind  of  strange  oblivion  has  spread 
over  me,"  he  says  in  April,  1764,  "so  that  I  know  not 
what  has  become  of  the  last  years,  and  perceive  that 
incidents  and  intelligence  pass  over  me  without  leaving 
any  impression." 

It  seoms,  however,  that  he  was  still  frequently  in 
difficulties.  Letters  are  preserved  showing  that  in  the 
beginning  of  1756,  Eichardson  became  surety  for  him  for 
a  debt,  and  lent  him  six  guineas  to  release  him  from 
arrest.  An  event  which  happened  three  years  later 
illustrates  his  position  and  character.  In  January,  1759, 
his  mother  died  at  the  age  of  ninety.  Johnson  was 
unable  to  come  to  Lichfield,  and  some  deeply  pathetic 
letters  to  her  and  her  stepdaughter,  who  lived  with  her, 
record  his  emotions.  Here  is  the  last  sad  farewell  upon 
the  snapping  of  the  most  sacred  of  human  ties. 
3* 


60  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAF. 

"Dear  Honoured  Mother,"  he  says  in  a  letter 
enclosed  to  Lucy  Porter,  the  step-daughter,  "neither 
your  condition  nor  your  character  make  it  fit  for  nie  to 
say  much.  You  have  "been  the  best  mother,  and  I  believe 
the  best  woman  in  the  world.  I  thank  you  for  your  in- 
dulgence to  me,  and  beg  forgiveness  of  all  that  I  have 
done  ill,  and  of  all  that  I  have  omitted  to  do  well.  God 
grant  you  His  Holy  Spirit,  and  receive  you  to  everlasting 
happiness  for  Jesus  Christ's  sake.  Amen.  Lord  Jesus 
receive  your  spirit.  I  am,  dear,  dear  mother, 
"  Your  dutiful  son, 

"  SAMUEL  JOHNSON." 

Johnson  managed  to  raise  twelve  guineas,  six  of  them 
borrowed  from  his  printer,  to  send  to  his  dying  mother. 
In  order  to  gain  money  for  her  funeral  expenses  and  some 
small  debts,  he  wrote  the  story  of  Rasselas.  It  was 
composed  in  the  evenings  of  a  single  week,  and  sent  to 
press  as  it  was  written.  He  received  £100  for  this, 
perhaps  the  most  successful  of  his  minor  writings,  and 
£25  for  a  second  edition.  It  was  widely  translated  and 
universally  admired.  One  of  the  strangest  of  literary 
coincidences  is  the  contemporary  appearance  of  this  work 
and  Voltaire's  Candide;  to  which,  indeed,  it  bears  in 
some  respects  so  strong  a  resemblance  that,  but  for  John- 
son's apparent  contradiction,  we  would  suppose  that  he 
had  at  least  heard  some  description  of  its  design.  The 
two  stories,  though  widely  differing  in  tone  and  style,  are 
among  the  most  powerful  expressions  of  the  melancholy 
produced  in  strong  intellects  by  the  sadness  and  sorrows  of 
the  world.  The  literary  excellence  of  Candide  has  secured 
for  it  a  wider  and  more  enduring  popularity  than  has 
fallen  to  the  lot  of  Johnson's  far  heavier  production.  But 


ii.]  LITERARY  CAREER.  61 

Rasselas  is  a  book  of  singular  force,  and  bears  the  most 
characteristic  impression  of  Johnsorv's  peculiar  tempera- 
ment. 

A  great  change  was  approaching  in  Johnson's  circum- 
stances. When  George  III.  came  to  the  throne,  it  struck 
some  of  his  advisers  that  it  would  be  well,  as  Boswell  puts 
it,  to  open  "  a  new  and  brighter  prospect  to  men  of  literary 
merit."  This  commendable  design  was  carried  out  by 
offering  to  Johnson  a  pension  of  three  hundred  a  year. 
Considering  that  such  men  as  Horace  "Walpole  and  his 
like  were  enjoying  sinecures  of  more  than  twice  as  many 
thousands  for  being  their  father's  sons,  the  bounty  does 
not  strike  one  as  excessively  liberal.  It  seems  to  haye 
been  really  intended  as  some  set-off  against  other  pensions 
bestowed  upon  various  hangers-on  of  the  Scotch  prime 
minister,  Bute.  Johnson  was  coupled  with  the  con- 
temptible scribbler,  Shebbeare,  who  had  lately  been  in  the 
pillory  for  a  Jacobite  libel  (a  "he-bear"  and  a  "  she-bear," 
said  the  facetious  newspapers),  and  when  a  few  months 
afterwards  a  pension  of  £200  a  year  was  given  to*  the  old 
actor,  Sheridan,  Johnson  growled  out  that  it  was  time  for 
him  to  resign  his  own.  Somebody  kindly  repeated  the 
remark  to  Sheridan,  who  would  never  afterwards  speak  to 
Johnson. 

The  pension,  though  very  welcome  to  Johnson,  who 
seems  to  have  been  in  real  distress  at  the  time,  suggested 
some  difficulty.  Johnson  had  unluckily  spoken  of  a  pen- 
sion in  his  Dictionary  as  "generally  understood  to  mean 
pay  given  to  a  State  hireling  for  treason  to  his  country." 
He  was  assured,  however,  that  he  did  not  come  within 
the  definition ;  and  that  the  reward  was  given  for  what 
he  had  done,  not  for  anything  that  he  was  expected  to  do. 
After  some  hesitation,  Johnson  consented  to  accept  the 


62  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

payment  thus  offered  without  the  direct  suggestion  of  any 
obligation,  though  it  was  probably  calculated  that  he 
would  in  case  of  need,  be  the  more  ready,  as  actually 
happened,  to  use  his  pen  in  defence  of  authority.  He  had 
not  compromised  his  independence  and  might  fairly  laugh 
at  angry  comments.  "  I  wish,"  he  said  afterwards,  "  that 
my  pension  were  twice  as  large,  that  they  might  make 
twice  as  much  noise."  "  I  cannot  now  curse  the  House  of 
Hanover,"  was  his  phrase  on  another  occasion  :  "  but  I 
think  that  the  pleasure  of  cursing  the  House  of  Hanover 
and  drinking  King  James's  health,  all  amply  overbalanced 
by  three  hundred  pounds  a  year."  In  truth,  his  Jacobitism 
was  by  this  time,  whatever  it  had  once  been,  nothing 
more  than  a  humorous  crotchet,  giving  opportunity  for 
the  expression  of  Tory  prejudice. 

"  I  hope  you  will  now  purge  and  live  cleanly  like  a 
gentleman,"  was  Beauclerk's  comment  upon  hearing  of  his 
friend's  accession  of  fortune,  and  as  Johnson  is  now 
emerging  from. Grub  Street,  it  is  desirable  to  consider  what 
manner  of  man  was  to  bo  presented  to  the  wider  circles 
that  were  opening  to  receive  him. 


ill.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  63 


CHAPTER  III 

JOHNSON   AND   HIS   FRIENDS. 

IT  is  not  till  some  time  after  Johnson  had  come  into  the 
enjoyment  of  his  pension,  that  we  first  see  him  through 
the  eyes  of  competent  observers.  The  Johnson  of  our 
knowledge,  the  most  familiar  figure  to  all  students  of 
English  literary  history  had  already  long  passed  the  prime 
of  life,  and  done  the  greatest  part  of  his  literary  work. 
His  character,  in  the  common  phrase,  had  been  "  formed  " 
years  before ;  as,  indeed,  people's  characters  are  chiefly 
formed  in  the  cradle ;  and,  not  only  his  character,  but  the 
habits  which  are  learnt  in  the  great  schoolroom  of  the 
world  were  fixed  beyond  any  possibility  of  change.  The 
strange  eccentricities  which  had  now  become  a  second 
nature,  amazed  the  society  in  which  he  was  for  over 
twenty  years  a  prominent  figure.  Unsympathetic  ob- 
servers, those  especially  to  whom  the  Chesterfield  type 
represented  the  ideal  of  humanity,  were  simply  disgusted 
or  repelled.  The  man,  they  thought,  might  be  in  his 
place  at  a  Grub  Street  pot-house ;  but  had  no  business  in 
a  lady's  drawing-room.  If  he  had  been  modest  and 
retiring,  they  might  have  put  up  with  his  defects ;  but 
Johnson  was  not  a  person  whose  qualities,  good  or  bad, 
were  of  a  kind,  to  be  ignored.  Naturally  enough,  the 
fashionable  world  cared  little  for  the  ragged  old  giant. 


54  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

"  The  great,"  said  Johnson,  "  had  tried  him  and  given  him 
lip  ;  they  had  seen  enough  of  him ; "  and  his  reason  was 
pretty  much  to  the  purpose.  "  Great  lords  and  great  ladies 
don't  love  to  have  their  mouths  stopped,"  especially  not, 
one  may  add,  hy  an  unwashed  fist. 

It  is  easy  to  "blame  them  now.  Everybody  can  see  that 
a  saint  in  beggar's  rags  is  intrinsically  better  than  a  sinner 
in  gold  lace.  But  the  principle  is  one  of  those  which 
serves  us  for  judging  the  dead,  much  more  than  for 
regulating  our  own  conduct.  Those,  at  any  rate,  may 
throw  the  first  stone  at  the  Horace  Walpoles  and  Chester- 
fields, who  are  qiiite  certain  that  they  would  ask  a  modern 
Johnson  to  their  houses.  The  trial  would  be  severe.  Poor 
Mrs.  Boswell  complained  grievously  of  her  husband's 
idolatry.  "  I  have  seen  many  a  bear  led  by  a  man,"  she 
said ;  "  but  I  never  before  saw  a  man  led  by  a  bear."  The 
truth  is,  as  Boswell  explains,  that  the  sage's  uncouth 
habits,  such  as  turning  the  candles'  heads  downwards  to 
make  them  burn  more  brightly,  and  letting  the  wax  drop 
upon  the  carpet,  "  could  not  but  be  disagreeable  to  a  lady." 

He  had  other  habits  still  more  annoying  to  people  of 
delicate  perceptions.  A  hearty  despiser  of  all  affectations, 
he  despised  especially  the  affectation  of  indifference  to 
the  pleasures  of  the  table.  "  For  my  part,"  he  said,  "  I 
mind  my  belly  very  studiously  and  very  carefully,  for  I 
look  upon  it  that  he  who  does  not  mind  his  belly  will 
hardly  mind  anything  else."  Avowing  this  principle 
he  would  innocently  give  himself  the  airs  of  a  scientific 
epicure.  "  I,  madam,"  he  said  to  the  terror  of  a  lady  with 
whom  he  was  about  to  sup,  "  who  live  at  a  variety  of  good 
tables,  am  a  much  better  judge  of  cookery  than  any 
person  who  has  a  very  tolerable  cook,  but  lives  much  at 
home,  for  his  palate  is  gradually  adapted  to  the  taste  of 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  55 

his  cook,  whereas,  madam,  in  trying  by  a  wider  range,  I 
can  more  exquisitely  judge."  But  his  pretensions  to 
exquisite  taste  are  by  no  means  borne  out  by  independent 
witnesses.  "  He  laughs,"  said  Tom  Davies,  "  like  a 
rhinoceros,"  and  he  seems  to  have  eaten  like  a  wolf — 
savagely,  silently,  and  with  undiscriminating  fury.  Ho 
was  not  a  pleasant  object  during  this  performance.  He 
was  totally  absorbed  in  the  business  of  the  moment,  a 
strong  perspiration  came  out,  and  the  veins  of  his  forehead 
swelled.  He  liked  coarse  satisfying  dishes — boiled  pork 
and  veal-pie  stuffed  with  plums  and  sugar ;  and  in  regard 
to  wine,  he  seems  to  have  accepted  the  doctrines  of  the 
critic  of  a  certain  fluid  professing  to  be  port,  who  asked, 
"  What  more  can  you  want  ?  It  is  black,  and  it  is  thick, 
and  it  makes  you  drunk."  Claret,  as  Johnson  put  it,  "is 
the  liquor  for  boys,  and  port  for  men ;  but  he  who  aspires 
to  be  a  hero  must  drink  brandy."  He  could,  however, 
refrain,  though  he  could  not  be  moderate,  and  for  all  the 
latter  part  of  his  life,  from  1766,  he  was  a  total  abstainer. 
Nor,  it  should  be  added,  does  he  ever  appear  to  have 
sought  for  more  than  exhilaration  from  wine.  His  earliest 
intimate  friend,  Hector,  said  that  he  had  never  but  onco 
seen  him  drunk. 

His  appetite  for  more  innocent  kinds  of  food  was 
equally  excessive.  He  Avould  eat  seven  or  eight  peaches 
before  breakfast,  and  declared  that  he  had  only  once  in 
his  -life  had  as  much  wall-fruit  as  he  wished.  His  con- 
sumption of  tea  was  prodigious,  beyond  all  precedent. 
Hawkins  quotes  Bishop  Burnet  as  having  drunk  sixteen 
large  cups  every  morning,  a  feat  which  would  entitle  him  to 
be  reckoned  as  a  rival.  "  A  hardened  and  shameless  tea- 
drinker,"  Johnson,  called  himself,  who  "with  tea  amuses 
the  evenings,  with  tea  solaces  the  midnights,  and  with  tea 


66  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

welcomes  the  mornings."  One  of  his  teapots,  preserved  by 
a  relic-hunter,  contained  two  quarts,  and  he  professed  to 
have  consumed  five  and  twenty  cups  at  a  sitting.  Poor 
Mrs.  Thrale  complains  that  he  often  kept  her  up  making 
tea  for  him  till  four  in  the  morning.  His  reluctance  to 
go  to  bed  was  due  to  the  fact  that  his  nights  were  periods 
of  intense  misery;  but  the  vast  potations  of  tea  can 
scarcely  have  tended  to  improve  them. 

The  huge  frame  was  clad  in  the  raggedest  of  garments, 
until  his  acquaintance  with  the  Thrales  led  to  a  partial 
reform.  His  wigs  were  generally  burnt  in  front,  from 
his  shortsighted  knack  of  reading  with  his  head  close  to 
the  candle ;  and  at  the  Thrales,  the  butler  stood  ready  to 
effect  a  change  of  wigs  as  he  passed  into  the  dining-room. 
Once  or  twice  we  have  accounts  of  his  bursting  into  un- 
usual splendour.  He  appeared  at  the  first  representation 
of  Irene  in  a  scarlet  waistcoat  laced  with  gold ;  and  on  one 
of  his  first  interviews  with  Goldsmith  he  took  the  troublo 
to  array  himself  decently,  because  Goldsmith  was  reported 
to  have  justified  slovenly  habits  by  the  precedent  of  the 
leader  of  his  craft.  Goldsmith,  judging  by  certain  famous 
suits,  seems  to  have  profited  by  the  hint  more  than  his 
preceptor.  As  a  rule,  Johnson's  appearance,  before  he 
became  a  pensioner,  was  worthy  of  the  proverbial  manner 
of  Grub  Street.  Beauclerk  used  to  describe  how  he  had 
once  taken  a  French  lady  of  distinction  to  see  Johnson  in 
his  chambers.  On  descending  the  staircase  they  heard  a 
noise  like  thunder.  Johnson  was  pursuing  them,  struck 
by  a  sudden  sense  of  the  demands  upon  his  gallantry. 
He  brushed  in  between  Beauclerk  and  the  lady,  and  seizing 
her  hand  conducted  her  to  her  coach.  A  crowd  of  people 
collected  to  stare  at  the  sage,  dressed  in  rusty  brown,  with 
a  pair  of  old  shoes  for  slippers,  a  shrivelled  wig  on  the  top 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  67 

of  his  head,  and  with  shirtsleeves  and  the  knees  of  his 
breeches  hanging  loose.  In  those  days,  clergymen  and 
physicians  were  only  just  abandoning  the  use  of  their 
official  costume  in  the  streets,  and  Johnson's  slovenly 
habits  were  even  more  marked  than  they  would  be  at 
present.  "  I  have  no  passion  for  clean  linen,"  he  once 
remarked,  and  it  is  to  be  feared  that  he  must  sometimes 
have  offended  more  senses  than  one. 

In  spite  of  his  uncouth  habits  of  dress  and  manners, 
Johnson  claimed  and,  in  a  sense,  with  justice,  to  be  a 
polite  man.  "  1  look  upon  myself,"  he  said  once  to  Bos- 
well,  "  as  a  very  polite  man."  He  could  show  the  stately 
courtesy  of  a  sound  Tory,  who  cordially  accepts  the  prin- 
ciple of  social  distinction,  but  has  far  too  strong  a  sense  of 
self-respect  to  fancy  that  compliance  with  the  ordinary 
conventions  can  possibly  lower  his  own  position.  Rank 
of  the  spiritual  kind  was  especially  venerable  to  him.  "  I 
should  as  soon  have  thought  of  contradicting  a  bishop," 
was  a  phrase  which  marked  the  highest  conceivable  degree 
of  deference  to  a  man  whom  he  respected.  Nobody,  again, 
could  pay  more  effective  compliments,  when  he  pleased  ; 
and  the  many  female  friends  who  have  written  of  him 
agree,  that  he  could  be  singularly  attractive  to  women. 
Women  are,  perhaps,  more  inclined  than  men  to  forgive 
external  roughness  in  consideration  of  the  great  charm  of 
deep  tenderness  in  a  thoroughly  masculine  nature.  A 
characteristic  phrase  was  his  remark  to  Miss  Monckton. 
She  had  declared,  in  opposition  to  one  of  Johnson's  pre- 
judices, that  Sterne's  writings  were  pathetic :  "  I  am  sure," 
she  said,  "  they  have  affected  me."  "  Why,"  said  Johnson, 
smiling  and  rolling  himself  about,  "that  is  because, 
dearest,  you  are  a  dunce  !"  When  she  mentioned  this  to 
him  some  time  afterwards  he  replied :  "  Madam,  if  I  had 


68  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

thought  so,  I  certainly  should  not  have  said  it."  The  truth 
could  not  be  more  neatly  put. 

Boswell  notes,  with  some  surprise,  that  when  Johnson 
dined  with  Lord  Monboddo  he  insisted  upon  rising  when 
the  ladies  left  the  table,  and  took  occasion  to  observe  that 
politeness  was  "  fictitious  benevolence,"  and  equally  useful 
in  common  intercourse.  Boswell's  surprise  seems  to  indi- 
cate that  Scotchmen  in  those  days  were  even  greater  bears 
than  Johnson.  He  always  insisted,  as  Miss  Reynolds  tells 
us,  upon  showing  ladies  to  their  carriages  through  Bolt 
Court,  though  his  dress  was  such  that  her  readers  would, 
she  thinks,  be  astonished  that  any  man  in  his  senses 
should  have  shown  himself  in  it  abroad  or  even  at  home. 
Another  odd  indication  of  Johnson's  regard  for  good  man- 
ners, so  far  as  his  lights  would  take  him,  was  the  extreme 
disgust  with  which  he  often  referred  to  a  certain  footman 
in  Paris,  who  used  his  fingers  in  place  of  sugar-tongs.  So 
far  as  Johnson  could  recognize  bad  manners  he  was  polito 
enough,  though  unluckily  the  limitation  is  one  of  con- 
siderable importance. 

Johnson's  claims  to  politeness  were  sometimes,  it  is  true, 
put  in  a  rather  startling  form.  "  Every  man  of  any  educa- 
tion," he  once  said  to  the  amazement  of  his  hearers, 
"  would  rather  be  called  a  rascal  than  accused  of  deficiency 
in  the  graces."  Gibbon,  who  was  present,  slily  inquired 
of  a  lady  whether  among  all  her  acquaintance  she  could 
not  find  one  exception.  According  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  he  went 
even  further.  Dr.  Barnard,  he  said,  was  the  only  man 
who  had  ever  done  justice  to  his  good  breeding ;  "  and  you 
may  observe,"  he  added,  "  that  I  am  well-bred  to  a  degree 
of  needless  scrupulosity."  He  proceeded,  according  to 
Mrs.  Thrale,  but  the  report  a  little  taxes  our  faith,  to  claim 
the  virtues  not  only  of  respecting  ceremony,  but  of  never 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  69 

contradicting  or  interrupting  his  hearers.  It  is  rather  odd 
that  Dr.  Barnard  had  once  a  sharp  altercation  with  John- 
son, and  avenged  himself  by  a  sarcastic  copy  of  verses  in 
which,  after  professing  to  learn  perfectness  from  different 
friends,  he  says, — 

Johnson  shall  teach  me  how  to  place, 
In  varied  light,  each  borrow'd  grace ; 

From  him  I'll  learn  to  write ; 
Copy  his  clear  familiar  style, 
And  by  the  roughness  of  his  file, 

Grow,  like  himself,  polite. 

Johnson,  on  this  as  on  many  occasions,  repented  of  the 
Mow  as  soon  as  it  was  struck,  and  sat  down  by  Barnard, 
"  literally  smoothing  down  his  arms  and  knees,"  and  be- 
seeching pardon.  Barnard  accepted  his  apologies,  but 
went  home  and  wrote  his  little  copy  of  verses. 

Johnson's  shortcomings  in.  civility  were  no  doubt  due, 
in  part,  to  the  narrowness  of  his  faculties  of  perception. 
He  did  not  know,  for  he  could  not  see,  that  his  uncouth 
gestures  and  slovenly  dress  were  offensive ;  and  he  was 
not  so  well  able  to  observe  others  as  to  shake  off  the  man- 
ners contracted  in  Grub  Street.  It  is  hard  to  study  a 
manual  of  etiquette  late  in  life,  and  for  a  man  of  Johnson's 
imperfect  faculties  it  was  probably  impossible.  Errors  of 
this  kind  were  always  pardonable,  and  are  now  simply 
ludicrous.  But  Johnson  often  shocked  his  companions  by 
more  indefensible  conduct.  He  was  irascible,  overbearing, 
and,  when  angry,  vehement  beyond  all  propriety.  He  was 
a  "  tremendous  companion,"  said  Garrick's  brother ;  and 
men  of  gentle  nature,  like  Charles  Fox,  often  shrank  from 
his  company,  and  perhaps  exaggerated  his  brutality. 

Johnson,  who  had  long  regarded  conversation  as  the 
chief  amusement,  came  in.  later  years  to  regard  it  as  almost 


60  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

the  chief  employment  of  life  ;  and  he  had  studied  the  art 
with  the  zeal  of  a  man  pursuing  a  favourite  hohby.  He 
had  always,  as  he  told  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  made  it  a 
principle  to  talk  on  all  occasions  as  well  as  he  could.  He 
had  thus  obtained  a  mastery  over  his  weapons  which  made 
him  one  of  the  most  accomplished  of  conversational  gla- 
diators. He  had  one  advantage  which  has  pretty  well 
disappeared  from  modern  society,  and  the  disappearance  of 
which  has  been  destructive  to  excellence  of  talk.  A  good 
talker,  even  more  than  a  good  orator,  implies  a  good  audi- 
ence. Modern  society  is  too  vast  and  too  restless  to  give 
a  conversationalist  a  fair  chance.  For  the  formation  of 
real  proficiency  in  the  art,  friends  should  meet  often,  sit 
long,  and  be  thoroughly  at  ease.  A  modern  audience 
generally  breaks  up  before  it  is  well  warmed  through,  and 
includes  enough  strangers  to  break  the  magic  circle  of  social 
electricity.  The  clubs  in  which  Johnson  delighted  were 
excellently  adapted  to  foster  his  peculiar  talent.  There  a 
man  could  "  fold  his  legs  and  have  his  talk  out " — a  plea- 
sure hardly  to  be  enjoyed  now.  And  there  a  set  of  friends 
meeting  regularly,  and  meeting  to  talk,  learnt  to  sharpen 
each  other's  skill  in  all  dialectic  manoeuvres.  Conversation 
may  be  pleasantest,  as  Johnson  admitted,  when  two  friends 
meet  quietly  to  exchange  their  minds  without  any  thought 
of  display.  But  conversation  considered  as  a  game,  as  a 
bout  of  intellectual  sword-play,  has  also  charms  which 
Johnson  intensely  appreciated.  His  talk  was  not  of  the 
encyclopaedia  variety,  like  that  of  some  more  modern  cele- 
brities ;  but  it  was  full  of  apposite  illustrations  and  un- 
rivalled in  keen  argument,  rapid  flashes  of  wit  and  humour, 
scornful  retort  and  dexterous  sophistry.  Sometimes  ho 
would  fell  his  adversary  at  a  blow;  his  sword,  as  Boswell 
said,  would  te  through  your  body  in  an  instant  without 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  61 

preliminary  flourishes ;  and  in  the  excitement  of  talking 
for  victory,  he  would  use  any  device  that  came  to  hand. 
"There  is  no  arguing  with  Johnson,"  said  Goldsmith, 
quoting  a  phrase  from  Gibber,  "  for  if  his  pistol  misses 
lire,  he  knocks  you  down  with  the  butt-end  of  it." 

Johnson's  view  of  conversation  is  indicated  by  his 
remark  about  Burke.  "  That  fellow,"  he  said  at  a  time  of 
illness,  "  calls  forth  all  my  powers.  "Were  I  to  see  Burke 
now,  it  would  kill  me."  "  It  is  when  you  come  close  to  a 
man  in  conversation,"  he  said  on  another  occasion,  "  that 
you  discover  what  his  real  abilities  are.  To  make  a  speech 
in  an  assembly  is  a  knack.  Now  I  honour  Thurlow,  sir  ; 
Thurlow  is  a  fine  fellow,  he  fairly  puts  his  mind  to  yours." 

Johnson's  retorts  were  fair  play  under  the  conditions  of 
the  game,  as  it  is  fair  play  to  kick  an  opponent's  shins  at 
football.  But  of  course  a  man  who  had,  as  it  were,  be- 
come the  acknowledged  champion  of  the  ring,  and  who 
had  an  irascible  and  thoroughly  dogmatic  temper,  was 
tempted  to  become  unduly  imperious.  In  the  company  of 
which  Savage  was  a  distinguished  member,  one  may  guess 
•that  the  conversational  fervour  sometimes  degenerated  into 
horse-play.  Want  of  arguments  would  be  supplied  by  per- 
sonality, and  the  champion  would  avenge  himself  by  bru- 
tality on  an  opponent  who  happened  for  once  to  be  getting 
the  best  of  him.  Johnson,  as  he  grew  older  and  got  into 
more  polished  society,  became  milder  in  his  manners  ;  but 
he  had  enough  of  the  old  spirit  left  in  him  to  break  forth 
at  times  with  ungovernable  fury,  and  astonish  the  well- 
regulated  minds  of  respectable  ladies  and  gentlemen. 

Anecdotes  illustrative  of  this  ferocity  abound,  and  his 
best  friends — except,  perhaps,  Eeynolds  and  Burke — had 
all  to  suffer  in  turn.  On  one  occasion,  when  he  had  made 
a  rude  speech  even  to  Eeynolds,  Boswell  states,  though  with 


62  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.       .  [CHAP. 

some  hesitation,  his  belief  that  Johnson  actually  "blushed. 
The  records  of  his  contests  in  this  kind  fill  a  large  space 
in  Boswell's  pages.  That  they  did  not  lead  to  worse  con- 
sequences shows  his  absence  of  rancour.  He  was  always 
ready  and  anxious  for  a  reconciliation,  though  he  would 
not  press  for  one  if  his  first  overtures  were  rejected.  There 
was  no  venom  in  the  wounds  he  inflicted,  for  there  was  no 
ill-nature  ;  he  was  rough  in  the  heat  of  the  struggle,  and  in 
such  cases  careless  in  distributing  blows  ;  but  he  never  en- 
joyed giving  pain.  None  of  his  tiffs  ripened  into  permanent 
quarrels,  and  he  seems  scarcely  to  have  lost  a  friend.  He 
is  a  pleasant  contrast  in  this,  as  in  much  else,  to  Horace 
"Walpole,  who  succeeded,  in  the  course  of  a  long  life,  in 
breaking  with  almost  all  his  old  friends.  ISTo  man  set  a 
higher  value  upon  friendship  than  Johnson.  "A  man,"  he 
said  to  Reynolds,  "  ought  to  keep  his  friendship  in  constant 
repair ;"  or  he  would  find  himself  left  alone  as  he  grew 
older.  "  I  look  upon  a  day  as  lost,"  he  said  later  in  life, 
"  in  wliich  I  do  not  make  a  new  acquaintance."  Making 
new  acquaintances  did  not  involve  dropping  the  old.  The 
list  of  his  friends  is  a  long  one,  and  includes,  as  it  were, 
successive  layers,  superposed  upon  each  other,  from  the 
earliest  period  of  his  life. 

This  is  so  marked  a  feature  in  Johnson's  character,  that 
it  will  be  as  well  at  this  point  to  notice  some  of  the  friend- 
ships from  which  he  derived  the  greatest  part  of  his 
happiness.  Two  of  his  schoolfellows,  Hector  and  Taylor, 
remained  his  intimates  through  life.  Hector  survived  to  give 
information  to  Boswell,  and  Taylor,  then  a  prebendary  of 
Westminster,  read  the  funeral  service  over  his  old  friend 
in  the  Abbey.  He  showed,  said  some  of  the  bystanders, 
too  little  feeling.  •  The  relation  between  the  two  men  was 
not  one  of  special  tenderness ;  indeed  they  were  so  little 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  IIIS  FfilENDS.  63 

congenial  that  Eoswell  rather  gratuitously  suspected  his 
venerable  teacher  of  having  an  eye  to  Taylor's  will.  It 
seems  fairer  to  regard  the  acquaintance  as  an  illustration 
of  that  curious  adhesiveness  which  made  Johnson  cling  to 
less  attractive  persons.  At  any  rate,  he  did  not  show  the 
complacence  of  the  proper  will-hunter.  Taylor  was  rector 
of  Bosworth  and  squire  of  Ashbourne.  He  was  a  fine 
specimen  of  the  squire-parson ;  a  justice  of  the  peace,  a 
warm  politician,  and  what  was  worse,  a  warm  "Whig.  He 
raised  gigantic  bulls,  bragged  of  selling  cows  for  120 
guineas  and  more,  and  kept  a  noble  butler  in  purple  clothes 
and  a  large  white  wig.  Johnson  respected  Taylor  as  a 
sensible  man,  but  was  ready  to  have  a  round  with  him  on 
occasion.  He  snorted  contempt  when  Taylor  talked  of 
breaking  some  small  vessels  if  he  took  an  emetic.  "  Bah," 
said  the  doctor,  who  regarded  a  valetudinarian  as  a  "  scoun- 
drel," "  if  you  have  so  many  things  that  will  break,  you 
had  better  break  your  neck  at  once,  and  there's  an  end 
on't."  Nay,  if  he  did  not  condemn  Taylor's  cows,  he 
criticized  his  bulldog  with  cruel  acuteness.  "  No,  sir,  he 
is  not  well  shaped  ;  for  there  is  not  the  quick  transition 
from  the  thickness  of  the  fore-part  to  the  tenuity — the 
thin  part — behind,  which  a  bulldog  ought  to  have."  On  the 
more  serious  topic  of  politics  his  Jacobite  fulminations 
roused  Taylor  "  to  a  pitch  of  bellowing."  Johnson  roared 
out  that  if  the  people  of  England  were  fairly  polled  (this 
Avas  in  1777)  the  present  king  would  be  sent  away  to-night, 
and  his  adherents  hanged  to-morrow.  Johnson,  however, 
rendered  Taylor  the  substantial  service  of  writing  sermons 
for  him,  two  volumes  of  which  were  published  after  they 
were  both  dead ;  and  Taylor  must  have  been  a  bold  man, 
if  it  be  true,  as  has  been  said,  that  he  refused  to  preach  a 
sermon  written  by  Johnson  upon  Mrs.  Johnson's  death,  on 


6i  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

the  ground  that  it  spoke  too  favourably  of  the  character 
of  the  deceased. 

Johnson  paid  frequent  visits  to  Lichfield,  to  keep  up  his 
old  friends.  One  of  them  was  Lucy  Porter,  his  wife's 
daughter,  with  whom,  according  to  Miss  Seward,  he  had 
been  in  love  before  he  married  her  mother.  He  was  at  least 
tenderly  attached  to  her  through  life.  And,  for  the  most- 
part,  the  good  people  of  Lichfield  seem  to  have  been  proud 
of  their  fellow-townsman,  and  gave  him  a  substantial  proof 
of  their  sympathy  by  continuing  to  him,  on  favourable  terms, 
the  lease  of  a  house  originally  granted  to  his  father.  There 
was,  indeed,  one  remarkable  exception  in  Miss  Seward, 
who  belonged  to  a  genus  specially  contemptible  to  the 
old  doctor.  She  was  one  of  the  fine  ladies  who  dabbled 
in  poetry,  and  aimed  at  being  the  centre  of  a  small  literary 
circle  at  Lichfield.  Her  letters  are  amongst  the  most 
amusing  illustrations  of  the  petty  affectations  and  squabbles 
characteristic  of  such  a  provincial  clique.  She  evidently 
hated  Johnson  at  the  bottom  of  her  small  soul ;  and,  in- 
deed, though  Johnson  once  paid  her  a  preposterous  com- 
pliment— a  weakness  of  which  this  stern  moralist  was  apt 
to  be  guilty  in  the  company  of  ladies — he  no  doubt  trod 
pretty  roughly  upon  some  of  her  pet  vanities. 

By  far  the  most  celebrated  of  Johnson's  Lichfield  friends 
was  David  Garrick,  in  regard  to  whom  his  relations  were 
somewhat  peculiar.  Reynolds  said  that  Johnson  con- 
sidered Garrick  to  be  his  own  property,  and  would  never 
allow  him  to  be  praised  or  blamed  by  any  one  else  without 
contradiction.  Reynolds  composed  a  pair  of  imaginary 
dialogues  to  illustrate  the  proposition,  in  one  of  which 
Johnson  attacks  Garrick  in  answer  to  Reynolds,  and  in  the 
other  defends  him  in  answer  to  Gibbon.  The  dialogues 
seem  to  be  very  good  reproductions  of  the  Johnsonian 


Hi.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  Go 

manner,  though  perhaps  the  courteous  Reynolds  was  a 
little  too  much  impressed  by  its  roughness  ;  and  they 
probably  include  many  genuine  remarks  of  Johnson's.  It 
is  remarkable  that  the  praise  is  far  more  pointed  and 
elaborate  than  the  blame,  which  turns  chiefly  upon  the 
general  inferiority  of  an  actor's  position.  And,  in  fact, 
this  seems  to  have  corresponded  to  Johnson's  opinion  about 
Garrick  as  gathered  from  BoswelL 

The  two  men  had  at  bottom  a  considerable  regard  for  each 
other,  founded  upon  old  association,  mutual  services,  and 
reciprocal  respect  for  talents  of  very  different  orders.  But 
they  were  so  widely  separated  by  circumstances,  as  well  as 
by  a  radical  opposition  of  temperament,  that  any  close 
intimacy  could  hardly  be  expected.  The  bear  and  the 
monkey  are  not  likely  to  be  intimate  friends.  Garrick's 
rapid  elevation  in  fame  and  fortune  seems  to  have  pro- 
duced a  certain  degree  of  envy  in  his  old  schoolmaster.  A 
grave  moral  philosopher  has,  of  course,  no  right  to  look 
askance  at  the  rewards  which  fashion  lavishes  upon  men 
of  lighter  and  less  lasting  merit,  and  which  he  professes  to 
despise.  Johnson,  however,  was  troubled  with  a  rather 
excessive  allowance  of  human  nature.  Moreover  he  had  the 
good  old-fashioned  contempt  for  players,  characteristic  both 
of  the  Tory  and  the  inartistic  mind.  He  asserted  roundly 
that  he  looked  upon  players  as  no  better  than  dancing-dogs. 
"  But,  sir,  you  will  allow  that  some  players  are  better 
than  others?"  "  Yes,  sir,  as  some  dogs  dance  better  than 
others."  So  when  Goldsmith  accused  Garrick  of  grossly 
flattering  the  queen,  Johnson  exclaimed,  "And  as  to 
meanness — how  is  it  mean  in  a  player,  a  showman,  a  fellow 
who  exhibits  himself  for  a  shilling,  to  flatter  his  queen  ?  " 
At  another  time  Boswell  suggested  that  we  might  respect 
a  great  player.  "  What !  sir,"  exclaimed  Johnson,  "  a 
4 


66  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

fellow  who  claps  a  hump  upon  his  back  and  a  lump  on  his 
leg  and  cries,  '  /  am  Richard  III.'  ?  Nay,  sir,  a  ballad- 
singer  is  a  higher  man,  for  he  does  two  things  :  he  repeats 
and  he  sings ;  there  is  both  recitation  and  music  in  his 
performance — the  player  only  recites." 

Such  sentiments  were  not  very  likely  to  remain  un- 
known to  Garrick  nor  to  put  him  at  ease  with  Johnson, 
whom,  indeed,  he  always  suspected  of  laughing  at  him. 
They  had  a  little  tiff  on  account  of  Johnson's  Edition  of 
Shakspeare.  From  some  misunderstanding,  Johnson  did 
not  make  use  of  Garrick's  collection  of  old  plays.  John- 
son, it  seems,  thought  that  Garrick  should  have  courted 
him  more,  and  perhaps  sent  the  plays  to  his  house; 
whereas  Garrick,  knowing  that  Johnson  treated  books 
with  a  roughness  ill- suited  to  their  constitution,  thought 
that  he  had  done  quite  enough  by  asking  Johnson  to 
come  to  his  library.  The  revenge — if  it  was  revenge — 
taken  by  Johnson  was  to  say  nothing  of  Garrick  in  his 
Preface,  and  to  glance  obliquely  at  his  non-communication 
of  his  rarities.  He  seems  to  have  thought  that  it  would  be 
a  lowering  of  Shakspeare  to  admit  that  his  fame  owed 
anything  to  Garrick's  exertions. 

Boswell  innocently  communicated  to  Garrick  a  criticism 
of  Johnson's  upon  one  of  his  poems — 

I'd  smile  with  the  simple  and  feed  with  the  poor. 

"  Let  me  smile  with  the  wise,  and  feed  with  the  rich," 
was  Johnson's  tolerably  harmless  remark.  Garrick,  how- 
ever, did  not  like  it,  and  when  Boswell  tried  to  console 
him  by  saying  that  Johnson  gored  everybody  in  turn,  and 
added,  "fcenum  habet  in  cornu."  "Ay,"  said  Garrick 
vehemently,  "  he  has  a  whole  mow  of  it." 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  67 

The  most  unpleasant  incident  was  when  Garrick  proposed 
rather  too  freely  to  be  a  member  of  the  Club.  Johnson 
said  that  the  first  duke  in  England  had  no  right  to  use 
such  language,  and  said,  according  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  "  If 
Garrick  does  apply,  I'll  blackball  him.  Surely  we  ought 
to  be  able  to  sit  in  a  society  like  ours — 

'  Unelbowed  by  a  gamester,  pimp,  or  player ! '  " 

Nearly  ten  years  afterwards,  however,  Johnson  favoured 
hi's  election,  and  when  he  died,  declared  that  the  Club 
should  haVe  a  year's  widowhood.  No  successor  to  Garrick 
was  elected  during  that  time. 

Johnson  sometimes  ventured  to  criticise  Garrick's  acting, 
but  here  Garrick  could  take  his  full  revenge.  The  pur- 
blind Johnson  was  not,  we  may  imagine,  much  of  a  critic 
in  such  matters.  Garrick  reports  him  to  have  said  of  an 
actor  at  Lichfield,  "  There  is  a  courtly  vivacity  about  the 
fellow ;"  when,  in  fact,  said  Garrick,  "  he  was  the  most 
vulgar  ruffian  that  ever  went  upon  boards." 

In  spite  of  such  collisions  of  opinion  and  mutual 
criticism,  Johnson  seems  to  have  spoken  in  the  highest 
terms  of  Garrick's  good  qualities,  and  they  had  many 
pleasant  meetings.  Garrick  takes  a  prominent  part  in  two 
or  three  of  the  best  conversations  in  Boswell,  and  seems 
to  have  put  his  interlocutors  in  specially  good  temper. 
Johnson  declared  him  to  be  "  the  first  man  in  the  world  for 
sprightly  conversation."  He  said  that  Dryden  had  written 
much  better  prologues  than  any  of  Garrick's,  but  that 
Garrick  had  written  more  good  prologues  than  Dryden.  He 
declared  that  it  was  wonderful  how  little  Garrick  had  been 
spoilt  by  all  the  flattery  that  he  had  received.  No  wonder 
if  he  was  a  little  vain  :  "  a  man  who  is  perpetually  flattered 


68  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CDAP. 

in  every  mode  that  can  be  conceived  :  so  many  bellows  have 
blown  the  fuel,  that  one  wonders  he  is  not  by  this  time  become 
a  cinder ! "  "  If  all  this  had  happened  to  me,"  he  said  on 
another  occasion,  "  I  should  have  had  a  couple  of  fellows 
with  long  poles  walkingbefore  me,  to  knock  down  everybody 
that  stood  in  the  way.  Consider,  if  all  this  had  happened 
to  Gibber  and  Quin,  they'd  have  jumped  over  the  inoon. 
Yet  Garrick  speaks  to  us,"  smiling.  He  admitted  at  the 
same  time  that  Ganick  had  raised  the  profession  of  a 
player.  He  defended  Garrick,  too,  against  the  common 
charge  of  avarice.  Garrick,  as  he  pointed  out,  had  been 
brought  up  in  a  family  whose  study  it  was  to  make  four- 
pence  go  as  far  as  fourpence-halfpenny.  Johnson  remem- 
bered in  early  days  drinking  tea  with  Garrick  when  Peg 
Woffington  made  it,  and  made  it,  as  Garrick  grumbled,  "  as 
red  as  blood."  But  when  Garrick  became  rich  he  became 
liberal.  He  had,  so  Johnson  declared,  given  away  more 
money  than  any  man  in  England. 

After  Garrick's  death,  Johnson  took  occasion  to  say,  in 
the  Lives  of  the  Poets,  that  the  death  "had  eclipsed  the 
gaiety  of  nations  and  diminished  the  public  stock  of  harm- 
less pleasures."  Boswell  ventured  to  criticise  the  observa- 
tion rather  spitefully.  "  Why  nations  ?  Did  his  gaiety 
extend  further  than  his  own  nation  ? "  "  Why,  sir,"  replied 
Johnson,  "  some  imagination  must  be  allowed.  Besides, 
we  may  say  nations  if  we  allow  the  Scotch  to  be  a  nation, 
and  to  have  gaiety — which  they  have  not."  On  the  whole, 
in  spite  of  various  drawbacks,  Johnson's  reported  observa- 
tions upon  Garrick  will  appear  to  be  discriminative,  and 
yet,  on  the  whole,  strongly  favourable  to  his  character. 
Yet  we  are  not  quite  surprised  that  Mrs.  Garrick  did  not 
rc-spond  to  a  hint  thrown  out  by  Johnson,  that  he  would 
be  glad  to  write  the  life  of  his  friend. 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  69 

At  Oxford,  Johnson  acquired  the  friendship  of  D". 
Adams,  afterwards  Master  of  Pembroke  and  author  of  a 
once  well-known  reply  to  Hume's  argument  upon  miracles. 
He  was  an  amiable  man,  and  was  proud  to  do  the  honours 
of  the  university  to  his  old  friend,  when,  in  later  years, 
Johnson  revisited  the  much-loved  scenes  of  his  neglected 
youth.  The  warmth  of  Johnson's  regard  for  old  days  is 
oddly  illustrated  by  an  interview  recorded  by  Boswell  with 
one  Edwards,  a  fellow-student  whom  he  met  again  in  1778, 
not  having  previously  seen  him  since  1729.  They  had 
lived  in  London  for  forty  years  without  once  meeting,  a 
fact  more  surprising  then  than  now.  Boswell  eagerly 
gathered  up  the  little  scraps  of  college  anecdote  which  the 
meeting  produced,  but  perhaps  his  best  find  was  a  phrase 
of  Edwards  himself.  "  You  are  a  philosopher,  Dr.  John- 
son," he  said ;  "  I  have  tried,  too,  in  my  time  to  be  a 
philosopher;  but,  I  don't  know  how,  cheerfulness  was 
always  breaking  in."  The  phrase,  as  Boswell  truly  says, 
records  an  exquisite  trait  of  character. 

Of  the  friends  who  gathered  round  Johnson  during  hia 
period  of  struggle,  many  had  vanished  before  he  became 
Avell  known.  The  best  loved  of  all  seems  to  have  been 
Dr.  Bathurst,  a  physician,  who,  failing  to  obtain  practice, 
joined  the  expedition  to  Havaimah,  and  fell  a  victim  to  the 
climate  (1762).  Upon  him  Johnson  pronounced  a  pane- 
gyric which  has  contributed  a  proverbial  phrase  to  the 
language.  "  Dear  Bathurst,"  he  said,  "  was  a  man  to  my 
very  heart's  content :  he  hated  a  fool  and  he  hated  a  rogue, 
and  he  hated  a  Whig ;  he  was  a  very  good  hater"  Johnson 
remembered  Bathurst  in  his  prayers  for  years  after  his  loss, 
and  received  from  him  a  peculiar  legacy.  Francis  Barber 
had  been  the  negro  slave  of  Bathurst's  father,  who  left  him 
his  liberty  by  will.  Dr.  Bathurst  allowed  him  to  enter 


?0  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Johnson's  service ;  and  Johnson  sent  him  to  school  at  con- 
siderable expense,  and  afterwards  retained  him  in  his 
service  with  little  interruption  till  his  own  death.  Once 
Barber  ran  away  to  sea,  and  was  discharged,  oddly  enough, 
by  the  good  offices  of  Wilkes,  to  whom  Smollett  applied 
on  Johnson's  behalf.  Barber  became  an  important  member 
of  Johnson's  family,  some  of  whom  reproached  him  for  his 
liberality  to  the  nigger.  No  one  ever  solved  the  great 
problem  as  to  what  services  were  rendered  by  Barber  to 
his  master,  whose  wig  was  "  as  impenetrable  by  a  comb  as 
a  quickset  hedge,"  and  whose  clothes  were  never  touched 
by  the  brush. 

Among  the  other  friends  of  this  period  must  be 
reckoned  his  biographer,  Hawkins,  an  attorney  who  was 
afterwards  Chairman  of  the  Middlesex  Justices,  and 
knighted  on  presenting  an  address  to  the  King.  Boswell 
regarded  poor  Sir  John  Hawkins  with  all  the  animosity  of 
a  rival  author,  and  with  some  spice  of  wounded  vanity. 
He  was  grievously  offended,  so  at  least  says  Sir  John's 
daughter,  on  being  described  in  the  Life  of  Johnson  as 
"  Mr.  James  Boswell "  without  a  solitary  epithet  such  as 
celebrated  or  well-known.  If  that  was  really  his  feeling, 
ho  had  his  revenge ;  for  no  one  book  ever  so  suppressed 
another  as  Boswell's  Life  suppressed  Hawkins's.  In  truth, 
Hawkins  was  a  solemn  prig,  remarkable  chiefly  for  the 
unusual  intensity  of  his  conviction  that  all  virtue  consists 
in  respectability.  He  had  a  special  aversion  to  "  goodness 
of  heart,"  which  he  regarded  as  another  name  for  a  quality 
properly  called  extravagance  or  vice.  Johnson's  tenacity  of 
old  acquaintance  introduced  him  into  the  Club,  where  he 
made  himself  so  disagreeable,  especially,  as  it  seems,  by 
rudeness  to  Burke,  that  he  found  it  expedient  to  invent  a 
pretext  for  resignation.  Johnson  called  him  a  "  very  un- 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  71 

clubable  man,"  and  may  perhaps  have  intended  him  in  the 
quaint  description  :  "  I  really  believe  him  to  be  an  honest 
man  at  the  bottom ;  though,  to  be  sure,  he  is  rather 
penurious,  and  he  is  somewhat  mean  ;  and  it  must  be  owned 
he  has  some  degree  of  brutality,  and  is  not  without  a  ten-- 
dency  to  savageness  that  cannot  well  be  defended." 

In  a  list  of  Johnson's  friends  it  is  proper  to  men- 
tion Richardson  and  Hawkesworth.  Richardson  seems 
to  have  given  him  substantial  help,  and  was  repaid  by 
favourable  comparisons  with  Fielding,  scarcely  borne  out 
by  the  verdict  of  posterity.  "  Fielding,"  said  Johnson, 
"could  tell  the  hour  by  looking  at  the  clock;  whilst 
Eichardson  knew  how  the  clock  was  made."  "  There  is 
more  knowledge  of  the  heart,"  he  said  at  another  time, 
"  in  one  letter  of  Eichardson's  than  in  all  Tom  Jones" 
Johnson's  preference  of  the  sentimentalist  to  the  man  whose 
humour  and  strong  sense  were  so  like  his  own,  shows  how 
much  his  criticism. was  biassed  by  his  prejudices  ;  though, 
of  course,  Eichardson's  external  decency  was  a  recommen- 
dation to  the  moralist.  Hawkesworth's  intimacy  with 
Johnson  seems  to  have  been  chiefly  in  the  period  between 
the  Dictionary  and  the  pension.  He  was  considered  to  be 
Johnson's  best  imitator ;  and  has  vanished  like  other  imi- 
tators. His  fate,  very  doubtful  if  the  story  believed  at  the 
time  be  true,  was  a  curious  one  for  a  friend  of  Johnson's. 
He  had  made  some  sceptical  remarks  as  to  the  efficacy  of 
prayer  in  his  preface  to  the  South  Sea  Voyages ;  and  was  so 
bitterly  attacked  by  a  "  Christian"  in  the  papers,  that  he 
destroyed  himself  by  a  dose  of  opium. 

Two  younger  friends,  who  became  disciples  of  the  sage 
soon  after  the  appearance  of  the  Rambler,  are  prominent 
figures  in  the  later  circle.  v  One  of  these  was  Bennet  Lang- 
ton,  a  man  of  good  family,  fine  scholarship,  and  very 


72  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

amiable  character.  His  exceedingly  tall  and  slender  figure 
was  compared  by  Best  to  the  stork  in  Eaphael's  cartoon  of 
the  Miraculous  Draught  of  Fishes.  Miss  Hawkins  describes 
him  sitting  with  one  leg  twisted  round  the  other  as  though 
to  occupy  the  smallest  possible  space,  and  playing  with  his 
gold  snuff-box  with  a  mild  countenance  and  sweet  smile. 
The  gentle,  modest  creature  Avas  loved  by  Johnson,  who 
could  warm  into  unusual  eloquence  in  singing  his  praises. 
The  doctor,  however,  was  rather  fond  of  discussing  with 
Boswell  the  faults  of  his  friend.  They  seem  to  have  chiefly 
consisted  in  a  certain  languor  or  sluggishness  of  tempera- 
ment which  allowed  his  affairs  to  get  into  perplexity.  Once, 
when  arguing  the  delicate  question  as  to  the  propriety  of 
telling  a  friend  of  his  wife's  unfaithfulness,  Boswell,  after 
his  peculiar  fashion,  chose  to  enliven  the  abstract  statement 
by  the  purely  imaginary  hypothesis  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lang- 
ton  being  in  this  position.  Johnson  said  that  it  would 
be  useless  to  tell  Langton,  because  he  would  be  too  sluggish 
to  get  a  divorce.  Once  Langton  was  the  unconscious 
cause  of  one  of  Johnson's  oddest  performances.  Langton 
had  employed  Chambers,  a  common  friend  of  his  and 
Johnson's,  to  draw  his  will.  Johnson,  talking  to  Cham- 
bers and  Boswell,  was  suddenly  struck  by  the  absurdity 
of  his  friend's  appearing  in  the  character  of  testator.  His 
companions,  however,  were  utterly  unable  to  see  in  what 
the  joke  consisted  ;  but  Johnson  laughed  obstreperously 
and  irrepressibly  :  he  laughed  till  he  reached  the  Temple 
Gate  ;  and  when  in  Fleet  Street  went  almost  into  convul- 
sions of  hilarity.  Holding  on  by  one  of  the  posts  in  the 
street,  he  sent  forth  such  peals  of  laughter  that  they  seemed 
in  the  silence  of  the  night  to  resound  from  Temple  Bar  to 
Fleet  Ditch. 

Not  long  before  his  death,  Johnson  applied  to  Langton 


HI.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  73 

for  spiritual  advice.  "  I  desired  him  to  tell  me  sincerely 
in  what  he  thought  my  life  was  faulty."  Langton  wrote 
upon  a  sheet  of  paper  certain  texts  recommending  Christian 
charity ;  and  explained,  upon  inquiry,  that  he  was  pointing 
at  Johnson's  habit  of  contradiction.  The  old  doctor  began 
by  thanking  him  earnestly  for  his  kindness  ;  but  gradually 
waxed  savage  and  asked  Langton,  "  in  a  loud  and  angry 
tone,"  What  is  your  drift,  sir  ] "  He  complained  of  the  well- 
meant  advice  to  Boswell,  with  a  sense  that  he  had  been 
unjustly  treated.  It  was  a  scene  for  a  comedy,  as  Rey- 
nolds observed,  to  see  a  penitent  get  into  a  passion  and 
belabour  his  confessor. 

Through  Langton,  Johnson  became  acquainted  with  the 
friend  whose  manner  was  in  the  strongest  contrast  to  his 
own.  Topham  Beauclerk  was  a  man  of  fashion.  He  was 
commended  to  Johnson  by  a  likeness  to  Charles  II.,  from 
whom,  he  was  descended,  being  the  grandson  of  the  first 
Duke  of  St.  Alban's.  Beauclerk  was  a  man  of  literary  and 
scientific  tastes.  He  inherited  some  of  the  moral  laxity 
which  Johnson  chose  to  pardon  in  his  ancestor.  Some 
years  after  his  acquaintance  with  Boswell  he  married  Lady 
Diana  Spencer,  a  lady  who  had  been  divorced  upon  his 
account  from  her  husband,  Lord  Bolingbroke.  But  he 
took  care  not  to  obtrude  his  faults  of  life,  whatever  they 
may  have  been,  upon  the  old  moralist,  who  entertained 
for  him  a  peculiar  affection.  He  specially  admired  Beau- 
clerk's  skill  in  the  use  of  a  more  polished,  if  less  vigorous, 
style  of  conversation  than  his  own.  He  envied  the  ease 
with  which  Beauclerk  brought  out  his  sly  incisive  retorts. 
"  No  man,"  he  said,  "  ever  was  so  free  when  he  was  going 
to  say  a  good  thing,  from  a  look  that  expressed  that  it  was 
coming  ;  or,  when  he  had  said  it,  from  a  look  that  ex- 
pressed that  it  had  come."  "When  Beauclerk  was  dying 
4* 


74  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

(in  1 780),  Johnson  said,  with  a  faltering  voice,  that  he 
would  walk  to  the  extremity  of  the  diameter  of  the  earth 
to  save  him.  Two  little  anecdotes  are  expressive  of  his 
tender  feeling  for  this  incongruous  friend.  Boswell  had 
asked  him  to  sup  at  Beauclerk's.  He  started,  but,  on  the 
way,  recollecting  himself,  said,  "  I  cannot  go  ;  but  /  do 
not  love  Beauclerk  the  less."  Beauclerk  had  put  upon  a 
portrait  of  Johnson  the  inscription, — 

Ingenium  ingena 
Inculto  latet  hoc  sub  corpore. 

Langton,  who  bought  the  portrait,  had  the  inscription 
removed.  "  It  was  kind  in  you  to  take  it  off,"  said 
Johnson;  and,  after  a  short  pause,  "  not  unkind  in  him  to 
put  it  on." 

Early  in  their  acquaintance,  the  two  young  men,  Beau 
and  Lanky,  as  Johnson  called  them,  had  sat  up  one  night 
at  a  tavern  till  three  in  the  morning.  The  courageous 
thought  struck  them  that  they  would  knock  up  the  old 
philosopher.  He  came  to  the  door  of  his  chambers,  poker 
in  hand,  with  an  old  wig  for  a  nightcap.  On  hearing  their 
errand,  the  sage  exclaimed,  "  What!  is  it  you,  you  dogs? 
I'll  have  a  frisk  with  you."  And  so  Johnson  with  the 
two  youths,  his  juniors  by  about  thirty  years,  proceeded 
to  make  a  night  of  it.  They  amazed  the  fruiterers  in 
Covent  Garden ;  they  brewed  a  bowl  of  bishop  in  a  tavern, 
while  Johnson  quoted  the  poet's  address  to  Sleep, — 

"  Short,  O  short,  be  then  thy  reign, 
And  give  us  to  the  world  again  ! " 

They  took  a  boat  to  Billingsgate,  and  Johnson,  with 
Beauclerk,  kept  up  their  amusement  for  the  following  day, 
when  Langton  deserted  them  to  go  to  breakfast  with  some 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  75 

young  ladies,  and  Johnson  scolded  him  for  leaving  his 
friends  "  to  go  and  sit  with  a  parcel  of  wretched  unidea'd 
girls."  "  I  shall  have  my  old  friend  to  bail  out  of  the 
round-house,"  said  Garrick  when  he  heard  of  this  queer 
alliance ;  and  he  told  Johnson  that  he  would  be  in  the 
Chronicle  for  his  frolic.  "  He  durst  not  do  such  a  thing. 
His  wife  would  not  let  him,"  was  the  moralist's  retort. 

Some  friends,  known  to  fame  by  other  titles  than  their 
connexion  with  Johnson,  had  by  this  time  gathered  round 
them.  Among  them  was  one,  whose  art  he  was  unable 
to  appreciate,  but  whose  fine  social  qualities  and  dignified 
equability  of  temper  made  him  a  valued  and  respected 
companion.  Reynolds  had  settled  in  London  at  the  end 
of  1752.  Johnson  met  him  at  the  house  of  Miss  Cotterell. 
Eeynolds  had  specially  admired  Johnson's  Life  of  Savage, 
-and,  on  their  first  meeting,  happened  to  make  a  remark 
which  delighted  Johnson.  The  ladies  were  regretting  the 
loss  of  a  friend  to  whom  they  were  under  obligations. 
"  You  have,  however,"  said  Eeynolds,  "  the  comfort  of 
being  relieved  from  a  burden  of  gratitude."  The  saying  is 
a  little  too  much  like  Eochefoucauld,  and  too  true  to  be 
pleasant ;  but  it  was  one  of  those  keen  remarks  which 
Johnson  appreciated  because  they  prick  a  bubble  of  com- 
monplace moralizing  without  demanding  too  literal  an  accep- 
tation. He  went  home  to  sup  with  Eeynolds  and  became 
his  intimate  friend.  On  another  occasion,  Johnson  was 
offended  by  two  ladies  of  rank  at  the  same  house,  and  by 
way  of  taking  down  their  pride,  asked  Eeynolds  in  a  loud 
voice,  "  How  much  do  you  think  you  and  I  could  get  in 
a  week,  if  we  both  worked  as  hard  as  we  could  ? "  "  His 
appearance,"  says  Sir  Joshua's  sister,  Miss  Eeynolds, 
"  might  suggest  the  poor  author :  as  he  was  not  likely  in 
that  place  to  be  a  blacksmith  or  a  porter."  Poor  Miss 


76  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Beynolds,  who  tells  this  story,  was  another  attraction  to 
Reynolds'  house.  She  was  a  shy,  retiring  maiden  lady, 
who  vexed  her  famous  brother  by  following  in  his  steps 
without  his  talents,  and  was  deeply  hurt  by  his  annoyance 
at  the  unintentional  mockery.  Johnson  was  through  life 
a  kind  and  judicious  friend  to  her ;  and  had  attracted 
her  on  their  first  meeting  by  a  significant  indication  of  his 
character.  He  said  that  when  going  home  to  his  lodgings 
at  one  or  two  in  the  morning,  he  often  saw  poor  children 
asleep  on  thresholds  and  stalls — the  wretched  "  street 
Arabs"  of  the  day — and  that  he  used  to  put  pennies  into 
their  hands  that  they  might  buy  a  breakfast. 

Two  friends,  who  deserve  to  be  placed  beside  Reynolds, 
came  from  Ireland  to  seek  their  fortunes  in  London. 
Edmund  Eurke,  incomparably  the  greatest  writer  upon 
political  philosophy  in  English  literature,  the  master  of  a 
style  unrivalled  for  richness,  flexibility,  and  vigour,  was 
radically  opposed  to  Johnson  on  party  questions,  though 
his  language  upon  the  French  Revolution,  after  Johnson's 
death,  would  have  satisfied  even  the  strongest  prejudices 
of  his  old  friend.  Eut  he  had  qualities  which  commended 
him  even  to  the  man  who  called  him  a  "  bottomless 
Whig,"  and  who  generally  spoke  of  "Whigs  as  rascals,  and 
maintained  that  the  first  Whig  was  the  devil.  If  his 
intellect  was  wider,  his  heart  was  as  warm  as  Johnson's, 
and  in  conversation  he  merited  the  generous  applause  and 
warm  emulation  of  his  friends.  Johnson  was  never  tired  of 
praising  the  extraordinary  readiness  and  spontaneity  of 
Eurke's  conversation.  "  If  a  man,"  he  said,  "  went  under 
a  shed  at  the  same  time  with  Eurke  to  avoid  a  shower, 
he  would  say,  '  This  is  an  extraordinary  man.'  Or  if 
Eurke  went  into  a  stable  to  see  his  horse  dressed,  the  ostler 
would  say,  '  We  have  had  an  extraordinary  man  here.' " 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  77 

"When  Burke  was  first  going  into  Parliament,  Johnson 
said  in  answer  to  Hawkins,  who  wondered  that  such  a  man 
should  get  a  seat,  "  We  who  know  Mr.  Burke,  know  that 
he  will  be  one  of  the  first  men  in  the  country."  Speaking 
of  certain  other  members  of  Parliament,  more  after  the 
heart  of  Sir  John  Hawkins,  he  said  that  he  grudged  success 
to  a  man  who  made  a  figure  by  a  knowledge  of  a  few 
forms,  though  his  mind  was  "  as  narrow  as  the  neck  of  a 
vinegar  cruet ;"  but  then  he  did  not  grudge  Burke's  being 
the  first  man  in  the  House  of  Commons,  for  he  would  be 
the  first  man  everywhere.  And  Burke  equally  admitted 
Johnson's  supremacy  in  conversation.  "  It  is  enough  for 
me,"  he  said  to  some  one  who  regretted  Johnson's  monopoly 
of  the  talk  on  a  particular  occasion,  "  to  have  rung  the 
bell  for  him." 

The  other  Irish  adventurer,  whose  career  was  more 
nearly  moulded  upon  that  of  Johnson,  came  to  London  in 
1756,  and  made  Johnson's  acquaintance.  Some  time 
afterwards  (in  or  before  1761)  Goldsmith,  like  Johnson, 
had  tasted  the  bitterness  of  an  usher's  life,  and  escaped 
into  the  scarcely  more  tolerable  regions  of  Grub  Street. 
After  some  years  of  trial,  he  was  becoming  known  to  the 
booksellers  as  a  serviceable  hand,  and  had  two  works  in 
his  desk  destined  to  lasting  celebrity.  His  landlady - 
(apparently  1764)  one  day  arrested  him  for  debt.  Johnson, 
summoned  to  his  assistance,  sent  him  a  guinea  and  speedily 
followed.  The  guinea  had  already  been  changed,  and 
Goldsmith  was  consoling  himself  with  a  bottle  of  Madeira. 
Johnson  corked  the  bottle,  and  a  discussion  of  ways  and 
means  brought  out  the  manuscript  of  the  Vicar  of  Wakc- 
field.  Johnson  looked  into  it,  took  it  to  a  bookseller,  got 
sixty  pounds  for  it,  and  returned  to  Goldsmith,  who  paid 
his  rent  and  administered  a  sound  rating  to  his  landlady. 


78  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

The  relation  thus  indicated  is  characteristic ;  Johnson 
was  as  a  rough  but  helpful  elder  brother  to  poor  Gold- 
smith, gave  him  advice,  sympathy,  and  applause,  and  at 
times  criticised  him  pretty  sharply,  or  brought  down  his 
conversational  bludgeon  upon  his  sensitive  friend.  "  He 
has  nothing  of  the  bear  but  his  skin,"  was  Goldsmith's 
comment  upon  his  clumsy  friend,  and  the  two  men  appre- 
ciated each  other  at  bottom.  Some  of  their  readers  may 
be  inclined  to  resent  Johnson's  attitude  of  superiority. 
The  admirably  pure  and  tender  heart,  and  the  exquisite 
intellectual  refinement  implied  in  the  Vicar  and  the 
Traveller,  force  us  to  love  Goldsmith  in  spite  of  super- 
ficial foibles,  and  when  Johnson  prunes  or  interpolates 
lines  in  the  Traveller,  we  feel  as  though  a  woodman's  axe 
was  hacking  at  a  most  delicate  piece  of  carving.  The 
evidence  of  contemporary  observers,  however,  must  force 
impartial  readers  to  admit  that  poor  Goldsmith's  foibles 
were  real,  however  amply  compensated  by  rare  and  admi- 
rable qualities.  Garrick's  assertion,  that  he  "  wrote  like 
an  angel  but  talked  like  poor  Poll,"  expresses  the  unani- 
mous opinion  of  all  who  had  actually  seen  him.  Un- 
doubtedly some  of  the  stories  of  his  childlike  vanity,  his 
frankly  expressed  envy,  and  his  general  capacity  for  blun- 
dering, owe  something  to  Boswell's  feeling  that  he  was 
a  rival  near  the  throne,  and  sometimes  poor  Goldsmith's 
humorous  self-assertion  may  have  been  taken  too  seriously 
by  blunt  English  wits.  One  may  doubt,  for  example, 
whether  he  was  really  jealous  of  a  puppet  tossing  a  pike, 
and  unconscious  of  his  absurdity  in  saying  "  Pshaw  !  I 
could  do  it  better  myself ! "  Boswell,  however,  was  too 
good  an  observer  to  misrepresent  at  random,  and  he  has, 
in  fact,  explained  very  well  the  true  meaning  of  his 
remarks.  Goldsmith  was  an  excitable  Irishman  of  genius, 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  79 

who  tumbled  out  whatever  came  uppermost,  and  revealed 
the  feelings  of  the  moment  with  utter  want  of  reserve. 
His  self-controlled  companions  wondered,  ridiculed,  mis- 
interpreted, and  made  fewer  hits  as  well  as  fewer  misses. 
His  anxiety  to  "  get  in  and  shine,"  made  him,  according 
to  Johnson,  an  "  unsocial "  companion.  "  Goldsmith,"  he 
said,  "  had  not  temper  enough  for  the  game  he  played.  He 
staked  too  much.  A  man  might  always  get  a  fall  from 
his  inferior  in  the  chances  of  talk,  and  Goldsmith  felt  his 
ff.lls  too  keenly."  He  had  certainly  some  trials  of  temper 
in  Johnson's  company.  "Stay,  stay,"  said  a  German, 
stopping  him  in  the  full  flow  of  his  eloquence,  "  Toctor 
Johnson  is  going  to  say  something."  An  Eton  Master 
called  Graham,  who  was  supping  with  the  two  doctors, 
and  had  got  to  the  pitch  of  looking  at  one  person,  and 
talking  to  another,  said,  "  Doctor,  I  shall  be  glad  to  see 
you  at  Eton."  "  I  shall  be  glad  to  wait  on  you,"  said 
Goldsmith.  "  No,"  replied  Graham,  "  'tis  not  you  I  mean, 
Doctor  Minor;  'tis  Doctor  Major  there."  Poor  Gold- 
smith said  afterwards,  "  Graham  is  a  fellow  to  make  one 
commit  suicide." 

Boswellwho  attributes  some  of  Goldsmith's  sayings  about 
Johnson  to  envy,  said  with  probable  truth  that  Goldsmith 
had  not  more  envy  than  others,  but  only  spoke  of  it  more 
freely.  Johnson  argued  that  we  must  be  angry  with  a 
'  man  who  had  so  much  of  an  odious  quality  that  he  could 
not  keep  it  to  himself,  but  let  it  "  boil  over."  The  feeling, 
at  any  rate,  was  momentary  and  totally  free  from  malice ; 
and  Goldsmith's  criticisms  upon  Johnson  and  his  idola- 
ters seem  to  have  been  fair  enough.  His  objection  to 
Boswell's  substituting  a  monarchy  for  a  republic  has 
already  been  mentioned.  At  another  time  he  checked 
Boswell's  flow  of  panegyric  by  asking,  "  Is  he  like  Burke, 


80  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

•who  winds  into  a  subject  like  a  serpent?"  To  which 
Boswell  replied  with  charming  irrelevance,  "  Johnson  is 
the  Hercules  who  strangled  serpents  in  his  cradle."  The 
last  of  Goldsmith's  hits  was  suggested  by  Johnson's 
shaking  his  sides  with  laughter  because  Goldsmith  admired 
the  skill  with  which  the  little  fishes  in  the  fable  were  made 
to  talk  in  character.  "  Why,  Dr.  Johnson,  this  is  not  so 
easy  as  you  seem  to  think,"  was  the  retort,  "  for  if  you  were 
to  make  little  fishes  talk,  they  would  talk  like  whales." 

In  spite  of  sundry  little  sparrings,  Johnson  fully  appre- 
ciated Goldsmith's  genius.  Possibly  his  authority  hastened 
the  spread  of  public  appreciation,  as  he  seemed  to  claim, 
whilst  repudiating  Boswell's  too  flattering  theory  that 
it  had  materially  raised  Goldsmith's  position.  When 
Reynolds  quoted  the  authority  of  Fox  in  favour  of  the 
Traveller,  saying  that  his  friends  might  suspect  that  they 
had  been  too  partial,  Johnson  replied  very  truly  that  the 
Traveller  was  beyond  the  need  of  Fox's  praise,  and  that 
the  partiality  of  Goldsmith's  friends  had  always  been 
against  him.  They  would  hardly  give  him  a  hearing. 
"  Goldsmith,"  he  added,  "  was  a  man  who,  whatever  he 
wrote,  always  did  it  better  than  any  other  man  could 
do."  Johnson's  settled  opinion  in  fact  was  that  embodied 
in  the  famous  epitaph  with  its  "nihil  tetigit  quod  non 
ornavit,"  and,  though  dedications  are  perhaps  the  only 
literary  product  more  generally  insincere  than  epitaphs,  we 
may  believe  that  Goldsmith  too  meant  what  he  said  in  the 
dedication  of  She  Stoops  to  Conquer.  "It  may  do  me 
some  honour  to  inform  the  public  that  I  have  lived  many 
years  in  intimacy  with  you.  It  may  serve  the  interests 
of  mankind  also  to  inform  them  that  the  greatest  wit  may 
be  found  in  a  character,  without  impairing  the  most  un- 
affected piety." 


HI.]  JOHNSOX  AND  HIS  FKIEXDS.  81 

Though  Johnson  was  thus  rich  in  friendship,  two  con- 
nexions have  still  to  be  noticed  which  had  an  exceptional 
bearing  upon  his  fame  and  happiness.  In  January,  1765, 
he  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  Thrales.  Mr.  Thrale 
was  the  proprietor  of  the  brewery  which  afterwards 
became  that  of  Barclay  and  Perkins.  He  was  married  in 
1 763  to  a  Miss  Hester  Lynch  Salisbury,  who  has  become 
celebrated  from  her  friendship  with  Johnson.1  She  was 
a  woman  of  great  vivacity  and  independence  of  character. 
She  had  a  sensitive  and  passionate,  if  not  a  very  tender 
nature,  and  enough  literary  culture  to  appreciate  Johnson's 
intellectual  power,  and  on  occasion  to  play  a  very  respect- 
able part  in  conversation.  She  had  far  more  Latin  and 
English  scholarship  than  fell  to  the  lot  of  most  ladies  of 
her  day,  and  wit  enough  to  preserve  her  from  degenerating 
like  some  of  the  "  blues,"  into  that  most  offensive  of 
beings — a  feminine  prig.  Her  marriage  had  been  one  of 
convenience,  and  her  husband's  want  of  sympathy,  and 
jealousy  of  any  interference  in  business  matters,  forced 
her,  she  says,  to  take  to  literature  as  her  sole  resource. 
"  !S"o  wonder,"  she  adds,  "  if  I  loved  my  books  and 
children."  It  is,  perhaps,  more  to  be  wondered  at  that 
her  children  seeru  to  have  had  a  rather  subordinate  place 
in  her  affections.  The  marriage,  however,  though  not  of 
the  happiest,  was  perfectly  decorous.  Mrs.  Thrale  dis- 
charged her  domestic  duties  irreproachably,  even  when 
she  seems  to  have  had  some  real  cause  of  complaint.  To 
the  world  she  eclipsed  her  husband,  a  solid  respectable 
man,  whose  mind,  according  to  Johnson,  struck  the  hours 
very  regularly,  though  it  did  not  mark  the  minutes. 


1  Mrs.  Thrale  was  born  in  1740  or  1741,  probably  the  latter. 
Thralo  was  born  in  1724. 


82  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

The  Thrales  were  introduced  to  Johnson  by  their 
common  friend,  Arthur  Murphy,  an  actor  and  dramatist, 
who  afterwards  became  the  editor  of  Johnson's  works. 
One  day,  when  calling  upon  Johnson,  they  found  him  in 
such  a  fit  of  despair  that  Thrale  tried  to  stop  his  mouth 
by  placing  his  hand  before  it.  The  pair  then  joined  in 
begging  Johnson  to  leave  his  solitary  abode,  and  come  to 
them  at  their  country-house  at  Streatham.  He  complied, 
and  for  the  next  sixteen  years  a  room  was  set  apart  for 
him,  both  at  Streatham  and  in  their  house  in  Southwark. 
He  passed  a  large  part  of  his  time  with  them,  and  derived 
from  the  intimacy  most  of  the  comfort  of  his  later  years. 
He  treated  Mrs.  Thrale  with  a  kind  of  paternal  gallantry, 
her  age  at  the  time  of  their  acquaintance  being  about 
twenty-four,  and  his  fifty-five.  He  generally  called  her  by 
the  playful  name  of  "  my  mistress,"  addressed  little  poems 
to  her,  gave  her  solid  advice,  and  gradually  came  to  con- 
fide to  her  his  miseries  and  ailments  with  rather  surprising 
frankness.  She  flattered  and  amused  him,  and  soothed 
his  sufferings  and  did  something  towards  humanizing  his 
rugged  exterior.  There  was  one  little  grievance  between 
them  which  requires  notice.  Johnson's  pet  virtue  in 
private  life  was  a  rigid  regard  for  truth.  He  spoke,  it  was 
said  of  him,  as  if  he  was  always  on  oath.  He  would  not, 
for  example,  allow  his  servant  to  use  the  phrase  "  not  at 
home,"  and  even  in  the  heat  of  conversation  resisted  the 
temptation  to  give  point  to  an  anecdote.  The  lively  Mrs. 
Thrale  rather  fretted  against  the  restraint,  and  Johnson 
admonished  her  in  vain.  He  complained  to  Boswell  that 
she  was  willing  to  have  that  said  of  her,  which  the  best 
of  mankind  had  died  rather  than  have  said  of  them. 
Boswell,  the  faithful  imitator  of  his  master  in  this  respect, 
delighted  in  taking  up  the  parable.  "  2s"ow,  madam,  give 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  83 

me  leave  to  catch  you  in  the  fact,"  he  said  on  one 
occasion ;  "  it  was  not  an  old  woman,  but  an  old  man  whom 
I  mentioned,  as  having  told  me  this,"  and  he  recounts  his 
check  to  the  "  lively  lady  "  with  intense  complacency.  As 
may  he  imagined,  Boswell  and  Mrs.  Thrale  did  not  love 
each  other,  in  spite  of  the  well-meant  efforts  of  the  sage  to 
hring  about  a  friendly  feeling  between  his  disciples. 

It  is  time  to  close  this  list  of  friends  with  the  inimitable 
Boswell.  James  Boswell,  born  in  1740,  was  the  eldest 
son  of  a  Whig  laird  and  lord  of  sessions.  He  had  acquired 
some  English  friends  at  the  Scotch  universities,  among 
whom  must  be  mentioned  Mr.  Temple,  an  English  clergy- 
man. Boswell's  correspondence  with  Temple,  discovered 
years  after  his  death  by  a  singular  chance,  and  published 
in  1857,  is,  after  the  Life  of  Johnson,  one  of  the  most 
curious  exhibitions  of  character  in  the  language.  Boswell 
was  intended  for  the  Scotch  bar,  and  studied  civil  law  at 
Utrecht  in  the  winter  of  1762.  It  was  in  the  following 
.summer  that  he  made  Johnson's  acquaintance. 

Perhaps  the  fundamental  quality  in  Boswell's  character 
was  his  intense  capacity  for  enjoyment.  He  was,  as  Mr. 
Carlyle  puts  it,  "  gluttonously  fond  of  whatever  would 
yield  him  a  little  solacement,  were  it  only  of  a  stomachic 
character."  His  love  of  good  living  and  good  drink  would 
have  made  him  a  hearty  admirer  of  his  countryman, 
Burns,  had  Burns  been  famous  in  Boswell's  youth.  No- 
body could  have  joined  with  more  thorough  abandonment 
in  the  chorus  to  the  poet's  liveliest  songs  in  praise  of  love 
and  wine.  He  would  have  made  an  excellent  fourth  when 
"  Willie  brewed  a  peck  of  malt,  and  Rab  and  Allan  came 
to  see,"  and  the  drinking  contest  for  the  Whistle  comme- 
morated in  another  lyric  would  have  excited  his  keenest 
interest.  He  was  always  delighted  when  he  could  get 


84  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Johnson  to  discuss  the  ethics  and  statistics  of  drinking. 
<:I  ana  myself,"  he  says,  "a  lover  of  wine,  and  therefore 
curious  to  hear  whatever  is  remarkable  concerning  drink- 
ing." The  remark  is  a  propos  to  a  story  of  Dr.  Campbell 
drinking  thirteen  bottles  of  port  at  a  sitting.  Lest  this 
should  seem  incredible,  he  quotes  Johnson's  dictum.  "  Sir, 
if  a  man  drinks  very  slowly  and  lets  one  glass  evaporate 
before  he  takes  another,  I  know  not  how  long  he  may 
drink."  Boswell's  faculty  for  making  love  was  as  great  as 
his  power  of  drinking.  His  letters  to  Temple  record 
with  amusing  frankness  the  vicissitudes  of  some  of  his 
courtships  and  the  versatility  of  his  passions. 

BoswelTs  tastes,  however,  were  by  no  means  limited  to 
sensual  or  frivolous  enjoyments.  His  appreciation  of  the 
bottle  was  combined  with  an  equally  hearty  sensibility  to 
more  intellectual  pleasures.  He  had  not  a  spark  of  philo- 
sophic or  poetic  power,  but  within  the  ordinary  range  of 
such  topics  as  can  be  discussed  at  a  dinner-party,  he  had  an 
abundant  share  of  liveliness  and  intelligence.  His  palate 
was  as  keen  for  good  talk  as  for  good.  wine.  He  was  an 
admirable  recipient,  if  not  an  originator,  of  shrewd  or 
humorous  remarks  upon  life  and  manners.  "What  in  regard 
to  sensual  enjoyment  was  mere  gluttony,  appeared  in 
higher  matters  as  an  insatiable  curiosity.  At  times  this 
faculty  became  intolerable  to  his  neighbours.  "  I  will 
not  be  baited  with  what  and  why,"  said  poor  Johnson, 
one  day  in  desperation.  "Why  is  a  cow's  tail  long] 
Why  is  a  fox's  tail  bushy  1 "  "  Sir,"  said  Johnson  on 
another  occasion,  when  Boswell  was  cross-examining  a 
third  person  about  him  in  his  presence.  "  You  have  but 
two  subjects,  yourself  and  me.  I  am  sick  of  both." 
Boswell,  however,  was  not  to  be  repelled  by  such  a 
retort  as  this,  or  even  by  ruder  rebuffs.  Once  when  dis- 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  85 

cussing  the  means  of  getting  a  frienci  to  leave  London, 
Johnson  said  in  revenge  for  a  previous  offence.  "  J^ay, 
sir,  we'll  send  you  to  him.  If  your  presence  doesn't  drive 
a  man  out  of  his  house,  nothing  will."  Boswell  was 
"  horribly  shocked,"  but  he  still  stuck  to  his  victim  like  a 
leech,  and  pried  into  the  minutest  details  of  his  life  and 
manners.  He  observed  with  conscientious  accuracy  that 
though  Johnson  abstained  from  milk  one  fast-day,  he  did 
not  reject  it  when  put  in  his  cup.  He  notes  the  whistlings 
and  puffings,  the  trick  of  saying  "  too-too-too  "  of  his  idol  : 
and  it  was  a  proud  day  when  he  won  a  bet  by  venturing 
to  ask  Johnson  what  he  did  with  certain  scraped  bits  of 
orange-peel.  His  curiosity  was  not  satisfied  on  this 
occasion;  but  it  would  have  made  him  the  prince  of 
interviewers  in  these  days.  Nothing  delighted  him  so 
much  as  rubbing  shoulders  with  any  famous  or  notorious 
person.  He  scraped  acquaintance  with  Voltaire,  "Wesley, 
Rousseau,  and  Paoli,  as  well  as  with  Mrs.  Eudd,  a  for- 
gotten heroine  of  the  Newgaie  Calendar.  He  was  as 
eager  to  talk  to  Hume  the  sceptic,  or  Wilkes  the  dema- 
gogue, as  to  the  orthodox  Tory,  Johnson;  and,  if 
repelled,  it  was  from  no  deficiency  in  daring.  In  1767, 
he  took  advantage  of  his  travels  in  Corsica  to  introduce 
himself  to  Lord  Chatham,  then  Prime  Minister.  The 
letter  moderately  ends  by  asking,  "  Could  your  lordslnp 
find  time  to  honour  me  noio  and  then  icith  a  letter  ?  I 
have  been  told  how  favourably  your  lordship  has  spoken 
of  me.  To  correspond  with  a  Paoli  and  with  a  Chatham 
is  enough  to  keep  a  young  man  ever  ardent  in  the  pursuit 
of  virtuous  fame."  K~o  other  young  man  of  the  day, 
we  may  be  sure,  woidd  have  dared  to  make  such  a 
proposal  to  the  majestic  orator. 

His  absurd  vanity,  and  the  greedy  craving  for  notoriety 


86  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

at  any  cost,  would  Save  made  Boswcll  the  most  offensive 
of  mortals,  had  not  his  unfeigned  good-humour  disarmed 
enmity.  Nobody  could  help  laughing,  or  be  inclined  to 
take  offence  at  his  harmless  absurdities.  Burke  said  of 
him  that  he  had  so  much  good-humour  naturally,  that  it 
was  scarcely  a  virtue.  His  vanity,  in  fact,  did  not 
generate  affectation.  Most  vain  men  arc  vain  of  qualities 
which  they  do  not  really  possess,  or  possess  in  a  lower 
degree  than  they  fancy.  They  are  always  acting  a  part, 
and  become  touchy  from  a  half-conscious  sense  of  the 
imposture.  But  Boswell  seems  to  have  had  few  such 
illusions.  He  thoroughly  and  unfeignedly  enjoyed  his 
own  peculiarities,  and  thought  his  real  self  much  too 
charming  an  object  to  be  in  need  of  any  disguise.  No  man, 
therefore,  was  ever  less  embarrassed  by  any  regard  for  his 
own  dignity.  He  was  as  ready  to  join  in  a  laugh  at  him- 
self as  in  a  laugh  at  his  neighbours.  He  reveals  his  own 
absurdities  to  the  world  at  large  as  frankly  as  Pepys  con- 
fided them  to  a  journal  in  cypher.  He  tells  us  how 
drunk  he  got  one  night  in  Skye,  and  how  he  cured  his 
headache  with  brandy  next  morning ;  and  what  an  in- 
tolerable fool  he  made  of  himself  at  an  evening  party  in 
London  after  a  dinner  with  the  Duke  of  Montrose,  and 
how  Johnson  in  vain  did  his  best  to  keep  him  quiet.  His 
motive  for  the  concession  is  partly  the  wish  to  illustrate 
Johnson's  indulgence,  and,  in  the  last  case,  to  introduce  a 
copy  of  apologetic  verses  to  the  lady  whose  guest  he  had 
been.  He  reveals  other  weaknesses  with  equal  frankness. 
One  day,  he  says,  "I  owned  to  Johnson  that  I  was 
occasionally  troubled  with  a  fit  of  narrowness."  "  Why. 
sir,"  said  he,  "  so  am  I.  But  I  do  not  tell  it"  Boswell 
enjoys  the  joke  far  too  heartily  to  act  upon  the  advice. 
There  is  nothing,  however,  which  Boswell  seems  to  have 


HI.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FBIENDS.  87 

enjoyed  more  heartily  than  his  own  good  impulses.  lie 
looks  upon  his  virtuous  resolution  with  a  sort  of  aesthetic 
satisfaction,  and  with  the  glow  of  a  virtuous  man  contem- 
plating a  promising  penitent.  Whilst  suffering  severely 
from  the  consequences  of  imprudent  conduct,  he  gets  a 
letter  of  virtuous  advice  from  his  friend  Temple.  He  in- 
stantly sees  himself  reformed  for  the  rest  of  his  days. 
"  My  warm  imagination,"  he  says,  "  looks  forward  with 
great  complacency  on  the  sobriety,  the  healthfulness,  and 
worth  of  my  future  life."  "  Every  instance  of  our  doing 
those  things  which  we  ought  not  to  have  done,  and  leaving 
undone  those  things  which  we  ought  to  have  done,  is 
attended,"  as  he  elsewhere  sagely  observes,  "  with  more  or 
less  of  what  is  truly  remorse  ;"  but  he  seems  rather  to  have 
enjoyed  even  the  remorse.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  the 
complacency  was  its  own  reward,  and  that  the  resolution 
vanished  like  other  more  eccentric  impulses.  Music,  he 
once  told  Johnson,  affected  him  intensely,  producing  in 
his  mind  "  alternate  sensations  of  pathetic  dejection,  so 
that  I  was  ready  to  shed  tears,  and  of  daring  resolution 
so  that  I  was  inclined  to  rush  into  the  thickest  of  the 
[purely  hypothetical]  battle."  "  Sir,"  replied  Johnson, 
"  I  should  never  hear  it,  if  it  made  me  such  a  fool." 
Elsewhere  he  expresses  a  wish  to  "  fly  to  the  woods',"  or 
retire  into  a  desert,  a  disposition  which  Johnson  checked 
by  one  of  his  habitual  gibes  at  the  quantity  of  easily  ac- 
cessible desert  in  Scotland.  Boswell  is  equally  frank  in 
describing  himself  in  situations  more  provocative  of  con- 
tempt than  even  drunkenness  in  a  drawing-room.  He 
tells  us  how  dreadfully  frightened  he  was  by  a  storm  at  sea 
in  the  Hebrides,  and  how  one  of  his  companions,  "  with 
a  happy  readiness,"  made  him  lay  hold  of  a  rope  fastened 
to  the  masthead,  and  told  him  to  pull  it  when  he  was 


63  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

ordered.     Boswell  was  thus  kept  quiet  in  mind  and  harm- 
less in  body. 

This  extreme  simplicity  of  character  makes  poor  Boswell 
loveable  in  his  way.  If  he  sought  notoriety,  he  did  not  so  far 
mistake  his  powers  as  to  set  np  for  independent  notoriety.1 
He  was  content  to  shine  in  reflected  light:  and  the 
affectations  with  which  he  is  charged  seem  to  have  been 
unconscious  imitations  of  his  great  idol.  Miss  Burney 
traced  some  likeness  even  in  his  dress.  In  the  later  pait 
of  the  Life  we  meet  phrases  in  which  Boswell  is  evidently 
aping  the  true  Johnsonian  style.  So,  for  example,  when 
somebody  distinguishes  between  "  moral "  and  "  physical 
necessity ;"  Boswell  exclaims,  "  Alas,  sir,  they  come  both 
to  the  same  thing.  You  may  be  as  hard  bound  by  chains 
when  covered  by  leather,  as  when  tho  iron  appears."  But 
he  specially  emulates  the  profound  melancholy  of  his  hero. 
He  seems  to  have  taken  pride  in  his  sufferings  from  hypo- 
chondria ;  though,  in  truth,  his  melancholy  diverges  from 
Johnson's  by  as  great  a  difference  as  that  which  divides 
any  two  varieties  in  Jaques's  classification.  Boswell's  was 
the  melancholy  of  a  man  who  spends  too  much,  drinks  too 
much,  falls  in  love  too  often,  and  is  forced  to  live  in  tho 
country  in  dependence  upon  a  stern  old  parent,  when  he 
is  longing  for  a  jovial  life  in  London  taverns.  Still  he  was 
excusably  vexed  when  Johnson  refused  to  believe  in  the 
reality  of  his  complaints,  and  showed  scant  sympathy  to 
his  noisy  would-be  fellow-sufferer.  Some  of  Boswell  s  freaks 

1  The  story  is  often  told  how  Boswell  appeared  at  the  Stratfoid 
Jubilee  with  "  Corsica  Boswell "  in  large  letters  on  his  hat.  The 
account  given  apparently  by  himself  is  sufficiently  amusing,  but 
the  statement  is  not  quite  fair.  Boswell  not  unnaturally  appeared 
at  a  masquerade  in  the  dress  of  a  Corsican  chief,  and  the  inscrip- 
tion on  his  hat  seems  to  have  been  "  Viva  la  Libert^." 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  89 

were,  in  fact,  very  trying.  Once  he  gave  up  writing  letters 
for  a  long  time,  to  see  whether  Johnson  would  bo  induced 
to  write  first.  Johnson  became  anxious,  though  he  half- 
guessed  the  truth,  and  in  reference  to  BosweLTs  confession 
gave  his  disciple  a  piece  of  his  mind.  "  Remember  that 
all  tricks  are  either  knavish  or  childish,  and  that  it  is  as 
foolish  to  make  experiments  upon  the  constancy  of  a  friend 
as  upon  the  chastity  of  a  wife." 

In  other  ways  Boswell  was  more  successful  in  aping  his 
friend's  peculiarities.  When  in  company  with  Johnson,  he 
became  delightfully  pious.  "  My  dear  sir,"  he  exclaimed 
once  with  unrestrained  fervour,  "  I  would  fain  be  a  good 
man,  and  I  am  very  good  now.  I  fear  God  and  honour 
the  king ;  I  wish  to  do  no  ill  and  to  be  benevolent  to  all 
mankind."  Boswell  hopes,  "  for  the  felicity  of  human 
nature,"  that  many  experience  this  mood ;  though  Johnson 
judiciously  suggested  that  he  should  not  trust  too  much  to 
impressions.  In  some  matters  Boswell  showed  a  touch  of 
independence  by  outvying  the  Johnsonian  prejudices.  Ho 
was  a  warm  admirer  of  feudal  principles,  and  especially 
held  to  the  propriety  of  entailing  property  upon  heirs  male. 
Johnson  had  great  difficulty  in  persuading  him  to  yield  to 
his  father's  wishes,  in  a  settlement  of  the  estate  which  con- 
travened this  theory.  But  Boswell  takes  care  to  declare 
that  his  opinion  was  not  shaken.  "  Yet  let  me  not  be 
thought,"  ho  adds,  "  harsh  or  unkind  to  daughters ;  for  my 
notion  is  that  they  should  be  treated  with  great  affection 
and  tenderness,  and  always  participate  of  the  prosperity 
of  the  family."  His  estimate  of  female  rights  is  indicated 
in  another  phrase.  When  Mrs.  Knowles,  the  Quaker, 
expressed  a  hope  that  the  sexes  would  be  equal  in  another 
world,  Boswell  replied,  "  That  is  too  ambitious,  madam. 
We  might  as  well  desire  to  be  equal  with  the  angels." 
5 


90  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Boswell,  again,  differed  from  Johnson — who,  in  spite  of  his 
love  of  authority,  had  a  righteous  hatred  for  all  recognized 
tyranny — by  advocating  the  slave-trade.  To  abolish  that 
trade  would,  he  says,  be  robbery  of  the  masters  and  cruelty 
to  the  African  savages.  Nay,  he  declares,  to  abolish  it 
would  be 

To  shut  the  gates  of  mercy  on  mankind  ! 

Boswell  was,  according  to  Johnson,  "  the  best  travelling 
companion  in  the  world."  In  fact,  for  such  purposes,  un- 
failing good-humour  and  readiness  to  make  talk  at  all 
hazards  are  high  recommendations.  "  If,  sir,  you  were 
shut  up  in  a  castle  and  a  new-born  baby  with  you,  what 
would  you  do  ? "  is  one  of  his  questions  to  Johnson, — 
a  propos  of  nothing.  That  is  exquisitely  ludicrous,  no 
doubt ;  but  a  man  capable  of  preferring  such  a  remark  to 
silence  helps  at  any  rate  to  keep  the  ball  rolling.  A  more 
objectionable  trick  was  his  habit  not  only  of  asking  pre- 
posterous or  indiscreet  questions,  but  of  setting  people  by 
the  ears  out  of  sheer  curiosity.  The  appearance  of  so  queer 
a  satellite  excited  astonishment  among  Johnson's  friends. 
"  Who  is  this  Scotch  cur  at  Johnson's  heels  1"  asked  some 
one.  "  He  is  not  a  cur,"  replied  Goldsmith ;  "  he  is  only 
a  bur.  Tom  Davies  flung  him  at  Johnson  in  sport,  and 
he  has  the  faculty  of  sticking."  The  bur  stuck  till  the  end 
of  Johnson's  life.  Boswell  visited  London  whenever  he 
could,  and  soon  began  taking  careful  notes  of  Johnson's 
talk.  His  appearance,  when  engaged  in  this  task  long 
afterwards,  is  described  by  Miss  Burney.  Boswell,  she 
says,  concentrated  his  whole  attention  upon  his  idol,  not 
even  answering  questions  from  others.  "\Vhen  Johnson 
spoke,  his  eyes  goggled  with  eagerness ;  he  leant  his  ear 
almost  on  the  Doctor's  shoulder ;  his  mouth  dropped  open 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FRIENDS.  91 

to  catch  every  syllable ;  and  lie  seemed  to  listen  even  to 
Johnson's  breathings  as  though  they  had  some  mystical 
significance.  He  took  every  opportunity  of  edging  him- 
self close  to  Johnson's  side  even  at  meal-times,  and  was 
sometimes  ordered  imperiously  back  to  his  place  like  a 
faithful  but  over-obtrusive  spaniel. 

It  is  hardly  surprising  that  Johnson  should  have 
been  touched  by  the  fidelity  of  this  queer  follower.  Bos- 
well,  modestly  enough,  attributes  Johnson's  easy  welcome 
to  his  interest  in  all  manifestations  of  the  human  mind, 
and  his  pleasure  in  an  undisguised  display  of  its  workings. 
The  last  pleasure  was  certainly  to  be  obtained  in  Boswell's 
society.  But  in  fact  Boswell,  though  his  qualities  were 
too  much  those  of  the  ordinary  "  good  fellow,"  was  not 
without  virtues,  and  still  less  without  remarkable  talents. 
He  was,  to  all  appearance,  a  man  of  really  generous  sym- 
pathies, and  capable  of  appreciating  proofs  of  a  warm  heart 
and  a  vigorous  understanding.  Foolish,  vain,  and  absurd  in 
every  way,  he  was  yet  a  far  kindlier  and  more  genuine  man 
than  many  who  laughed  at  him.  His  singular  gifts  as  an 
observer  could  only  escape  notice  from  a  careless  or  inexpe- 
rienced reader.  Boswell  has  a  little  of  the  true  Shaksperian 
secret.  He  lets  his  characters  show  themselves  without 
obtruding  unnecessary  comment.  He  never  misses  the 
point  of  a  story,  though  he  does  not  ostentatiously  call  our 
attention  to  it.  He  gives  just  what  is  wanted  to  indicate 
character,  or  to  explain  the  full  meaning  of  a  repartee. 
It^is  not  till  we  compare  his  reports  with  those  of 
less  skilful  hearers,  that  we  can  appreciate  the  skill  with 
which  the  essence  of  a  conversation  is  extracted,  and  the 
whole  scene  indicated  by  a  few  telling  touches.  We  aro 
tempted  to  fancy  that  we  have  heard  the  very  thing,  and 
..  rashly  infer  that  Boswell  was  simply  the  mechanical  trans- 


92  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAF. 

mittcr  of  the  good  things  uttered.  Any  one  who  will  try  to 
put  down  the  pith  of  a  brilliant  conversation  within  the 
same  space,  may  soon  satisfy  himself  of  the  absurdity  of  such 
an  hypothesis,  and  will  learn  to  appreciate  BosweLTs  powers 
not  only  of  memory  but  artistic  representation.  Such  a 
feat  implies  not  only  admirable  quickness  of  appreciation, 
but  a  rare  literary  faculty.  Boswell's  accuracy  is  remark- 
able ;  but  it  is  the  least  part  of  his  merit. 

The  book  which  so  faithfully  reflects  the  peculiarities  of 
its  hero  and  its  author  became  the  first  specimen  of  a  new 
literary  type.  Johnson  himself  was  a  master  in  one  kind 
of  biography ;  that  which  sets  forth  a  condensed  and 
vigorous  statement  of  the  essentials  of  a  man's  life  and 
character.  Other  biographers  had  given  excellent  memoirs 
of  men  considered  in  relation  to  the  chief  historical  currents 
of  the  time.  But  a  full-length  portrait  of  a  man's  domestic 
life  with  enough  picturesque  detail  to  enable  us  to  see 
him  through  the  eyes  of  private  friendship  did  not  exist 
in  the  language.  Boswell's  originality  and  merit  may  bo 
tested  by  comparing  his  book  to  the  ponderous  perform- 
ance of  Sir  John  Hawkins,  or  to  the  dreary  dissertations, 
falsely  called  lives,  of  which  Dugald  Stewart's  Life  of 
Robertson  may  be  taken  for  a  type.  The  writer  is  so 
anxious  to  be  dignified  and  philosophical  that  the  despair- 
ing reader  seeks  in  vain  for  a  single  vivid  touch,  and 
discovers  even  the  main  facts  of  the  hero's  life  by  some 
indirect  allusion.  Boswell's  example  has  been  more  or 
less  followed  by  innumerable  successors ;  and  AVC  owe  it 
in  some  degree  to  his  example  that  we  have  such  delight- 
ful books  as  Lockhart's  Life  of  Scott  or  .Mr.  Trevelyan's 
Life  of  Macqulay.  Yet  no  later  biographer  has  been  quite 
as  fortunate  in  a  subject ;  and  Boswell  remains  as  not  only 
the  first,  but  the  best  of  his  class. 


in.]  JOHNSON  AND  HIS  FEIENDS.  93 

One  special  merit  implies  something  like  genius.  Macaulay 
lias  given  to  the  usual  complaint  which  distorts  the  vision 
of  most  biographers  the  name  of  lues  Boswelliana.  It  is 
true  that  Boswell's  adoration  of  his  hero  is  a  typical  ex- 
ample of  the  feeling.  But  that  which  distinguishes  Eos- 
well,  and  renders  the  phrase  unjust,  is  that  in  him  adoration 
never  hindered  accuracy  of  portraiture.  "  I  will  not  make 
my  tiger  a  cat  to  please  anybody,"  was  his  answer  to  well- 
meaning  entreaties  of  Hannah  More  to  soften  his  accounts 
of  Johnson's  asperities.  He  saw  instinctively  that  a  man 
who  is  worth  anything  loses  far  more  than  he  gains  by 
such  posthumous  flattery.  The  whole  picture  is  toned 
down,  and  the  lights  are  depressed  as  well  as  the  shadows. 
The  truth  is  that  it  is  unscientific  to  consider  a  man  as  a 
bundle  of  separate  good  and  bad  qualities,  of  which  one 
half  may  be  concealed  without  injury  to  the  rest.  John- 
son's fits  of  bad  temper,  like  Goldsmith's  blundering,  must 
be  unsparingly  revealed  by  a  biographer,  because  they  are 
in  fact  expressions  of  the  whole  character.  It  is  necessary 
to  take  them  into  account  in  orderreally  to  understand  either 
the  merits  or  the  shortcomings.  When  they  are  softened  or 
omitted,  the  whole  story  becomes  an  enigma,  and  we  are 
often  tempted  to  substitute  some  less  creditable  explana- 
tion of  errors  for  the  true  one.  We  should  not  do  justice 
to  Johnson's  intense  tenderness,  if  we  did  not  see  how 
often  it  was  masked  by  an  irritability  pardonable  in  itself, 
and  not  affecting  the  deeper  springs  of  action.  To  bring 
out  the  beauty  of  a  character  by  means  of  its  external 
oddities  is  the  triumph  of  a  kindly  humourist ;  and  Bos- 
well  would  have  acted  as  absurdly  in  suppressing  Johnson's 
weaknesses,  as  Sterne  would  have  done  had  he  made  Uncle 
Toby  a  perfectly  sound  and  rational  person.  But  to  seo 
this  required  an  insight  so  rare  that  it  is  wanting  in  nearly 


9A  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

all  the  biographers  who  have  followed  Boswell's   steps, 
and  is  the  most  conclusive  proof  that  Boswell  was  a  man 
of  a  higher  intellectual  capacity  than  has  "been  generally 
\    admitted. 


JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  95 


CHAPTER  IV. 

JOHNSON   AS   A  LITERARY  DICTATOR. 

have  now  reached  the  point  at  which  Johnson's  life 
becomes  distinctly  visible  through  the  eyes  of  a  competent 
observer.  The  last  twenty  years  are  those  which  are 
really  familiar  to  us  ;  and  little  remains  but  to  give  some 
brief  selection  of  Boswell's  anecdotes.  The  task,  however, 
is  a  difficult  one.  It  is  easy  enough  to  make  a  selection 
of  the  gems  of  Boswell's  narrative ;  but  it  is  also  inevitable 
that,  taken  from  their  setting,  they  should  lose  the  greatest 
part  of  their  brilliance.  We  lose  all  the  quaint  semi- 
conscious touches  of  character  which  make  the  original  so 
fascinating ;  and  Boswell's  absurdities  become  less  amusing 
when  we  are  able  to  forget  for  an  instant  that  the  perpe- 
trator is  also  the  narrator.  The  effort,  however,  must  be 
made ;  and  it  will  be  best  to  premise  a  brief  statement  of 
the  external  conditions  of  the  life. 

From  the  time  of  the  pension  until  his  death,  Johnson 
was  elevated  above  the  fear  of  poverty.  He  had  a  pleasant 
refuge  at  the  Thrales',  where  much  of  his  time  was  spent ; 
and  many  friends  gathered  round  him  and  regarded  his 
utterances  with  even  excessive  admiration.  He  had  still 
frequent  periods  of  profound  depression.  His  diaries 
reveal  an  inner  life  tormented  by  gloomy  forebodings,  by 
remorse  for  past  indolence  and  futile  resolutions  of  amend- 
ment ;  but  he  conld  always  escape  from  himself  to  a  society 


93  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

of  friends  and  admirers.  His  abandonment  of  wine  seems 
to  have  improved  his  health  and  diminished  the  intensity 
of  his  melancholy  fits.  His  literary  activity,  however, 
nearly  ceased.  He  wrote  a  few  political  pamphlets  in 
defence  of  Government,  and  after  a  long  period  of  indolence 
managed  to  complete  his  last  conspicuous  work — the  Lives 
of  f.Jie  Posts,  which  was  published  in  1779  and  1781.  One 
other  book  of  some  interest  appeared  in  1775.  It  was  an 
account  of  the  journey  made  with  Boswell  to  the  Hebrides 
in  1773.  This  journey  was  in  fact  the  chief  interruption 
to  the  even  tenour  of  his  life.  He  made  a  tour  to  Wales 
with  theThrales  in  1774  ;  and  spent  a  month  with  them 
in  Paris  in  1775.  For  the  rest  of  the  period  he  lived 
chiefly  in  London  or  at  Streatham,  making  occasional  trips 
to  Lichfield  and  Oxford,  or  paying  visits  to  Taylor,  Lang- 
ton,  and  one  or  two  other  friends.  It  was,  however,  in 
the  London  which  he  loved  so  ardently  ("a  man,"  he  said 
once,  "  who  is  tired  of  London  is  tired  of  life"),  that  he  was 
chiefly  conspicuous.  There  he  talked  and  drank  tea 
illrmitably  at  his  friends'  houses,  or  argued  and  laid 
down  the  law  to  his  disciples  collected  in  a  tavern  instead 
of  Academic  groves.  Especially  he  was  in  all  his  glory 
at  the  Club,  which  began  its  meetings  in  February,  17G4, 
and  was  afterwards  known  as  the  Literary  Club.  This  Club 
was  founded  by  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds,  "  our  Romulus,"  as 
Johnson  called  him.  The  original  members  were  Eeynolds, 
Johnson,  Burke,  Nugent,  Beauclerk,  Langton,  Goldsmith, 
Chamier,  and  Hawkins.  They  met  weekly  at  the  Turk's 
Head,  in  Gerard  Street,  Soho,  at  seven  o'clock,  and  the 
talk  generally  continued  tilTa  late  hour.  The  Club  was 
afterwards  increased  in  numbers,  and  the  weekly  supper 
changed  to  a  fortnightly  dinner.  It  continued  to  thrive, 
and  election  to  it  came  to  be  as  great  an  honour  in  certain 


iv,]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  97 

circles  as  election  to  a  membership  of  Parliament.  Among 
the  members  elected  in  Johnson's  lifetime  were  Percy  of 
the  Reliques,  Garrick,  Sir  W.  Jones,  Boswell,  Fox,  Stee- 
vens,  Gibbon,  Adam  Smith,  the  Wartons,  Sheridan,  Dun- 
ning, Sir  Joseph  Banks,  Windham,  Lord  S  to  well,  Malone, 
and  Dr.  Barney.  What  was  best  in  the  conversation  at 
the  time  was  doubtless  to  be  found  at  its  meetings. 

Johnson's  habitual  mode  of  life  is  described  by  Dr. 
Maxwell,  one  of  Bosweli's  friends,  who  made  his  acquain- 
tance in  1754.  Maxwell  generally  called  upon  him  about 
twelve,  and  found  him  in  bed  or  declaiming  over  his  tea. 
A  levee,  chiefly  of  literary  men,  surrounded  him ;  and  he 
seemed  to  be  regarded  as  a  kind  of  oracle  to  whom  every 
one  might  resort  for  advice  or  instruction.  After  talking 
all  the  morning,  he  dined  at  a  tavern,  staying  late  and 
then  going  to  some  friend's  house  for- tea,  over  which  he 
again  loitered  for  a  long  time.  Maxwell  is  puzzled  to 
know  when  he  could  have  read  or  written.  The  answer 
seems  to  be  pretty  obvious ;  namely,  that  after  the  publi- 
cation of  the  Dictionary  he  wrote  very  little,  and  that, 
when  he  did  write,  it  was  generally  in  a  brief  spasm  of 
feverish  energy.  One  may  understand  that  Johnson  should 
have  frequently  reproached  himself  for  his  indolence ; 
though  he 'seems  to  have  occasionally  comforted  himself 
by  thinking  that  he  could  do  good  by  talking  as  well  as 
by  writing.  He  said  that  a  man  should  have  a  part  of  his 
life  to  himself ;  and  compared  himself  to  a  physician  re- 
tired to  a  small  town  from  practice  in  a  great  city.  Bos- 
well,  in  spite  of  this,  said  that  he  still  wondered  that 
Johnson  had  not  more  pleasure  in  writing  than  in.  not 
writing.  "  Sir,"  replied  the  oracle,  "  you  may  wonder." 

I  will  now  endeavour,  with  Bosweli's  guidance,  to  de- 
scribe a  few  of  the  characteristic  scenes  which  can  bo  fully 
5* 


98  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP 

enjoyed  in  his  pages  alone.  The  first  must  be  the  intro- 
duction of  Boswell  to  the  sage.  Boswell  had  come  to 
London  eager  for  the  acquaintance  of  literary  magnates. 
He  already  knew  Goldsmith,  who  had  inflamed  his  desire 
for  an  introduction  to  Johnson.  Once  when  Boswell  spoke 
of  Levett,  one  of  Johnson's  dependents,  Goldsmith  had  said, 
"  he  is  poor  and  honest,  which  is  recommendation  enough 
to  Johnson."  Another  time,  when  Boswell  had  wondered 
at  Johnson's  kindness  to  a  man  of  bad  character,  Gold- 
smith had  replied,  "  He  is  now  become  miserable,  and  that 
insures  the  protection  of  Johnson."  Boswell  had  hoped 
for  an  introduction  through  the  elder  Sheridan  ;  but 
Sheridan  never  forgot  the  contemptuous  phrase  in  which 
Johnson  had  referred  to  his  fellow-pensioner.  Possibly 
Sheridan  had  heard  of  one  other  Johnsonian  remark. 
"  Why,  sir,"  he  had  said,  "  Sherry  is  dull,  naturally  dull ; 
but  it  must  have  taken  him  a  great  deal  of  pains  to  be- 
come what  we  now  see  him.  Such  an  excess  of  stupidity, 
sir,  is  not  in  Mature."  At  another  time  he  said,  "  Sheri- 
dan cannot  bear  me ;  I  bring  his  declamation  to  a  point." 
"  What  influence  can  Mr.  Sheridan  have  upon  the  lan- 
guage of  this  great  country  by  his  narrow  exertions  ?  Sir, 
it  is  burning  a  farthing  candle  at  Dover  to  show  light  at 
Calais."  Boswell,  however,  was  acquainted  with  Davies, 
an  actor  turned  bookseller,  now  chiefly  remembered  by  a 
line  in  Churchill's  Rosciad  which  is  said  to  have  driven 
him  from  the  stage — 

He  mouths  a  sentence  as  curs  mouth  a  bone. 

Boswell  was  drinking  tea  with  Davies  and  his  wife  in  their 
back  parlour  when  Johnson  came  into  the  shop.  Davies, 
seeing  him  through  the  glass-door,  announced  his  approach 
to  Boswell  in  the  spirit  of  Horatio  addressing  Hamlet : 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERAEY  DICTATOR.  99 

"Look,  my  Lord,  it  comes !"  Davies  introduced  tho 
young  Scotchman,  who,  remembered  Johnson's  proverbial 
prejudices.  "Don't  tell  him  where  I  come  from!"  cried 
Boswell.  "  From  Scotland,"  said  Davies  roguishly.  "  Mr. 
Johnson,"  said  Boswell,  "  I  do  indeed  come  from  Scot- 
land ;  but  I  cannot  help  it !  "  "  That,  sir,"  was  the  first  of 
Johnson's  many  retorts  to  his  worshipper,  "  is  what  a  great 
many  of  your  countrymen  cannot  help." 

Poor  Boswell  was  stunned ;  but  he  recovered  when 
Johnson  observed  to  Davies,  "  What  do  you  think  of  Gar- 
rick  ?  He  has  refused  me  an  order  for  the  play  for  Miss 
Williams  because  he  knows  the  house  will  be  full,  and 
that  an  order  would  be  worth  three  shillings."  "  0,  sir," 
intruded  the  unlucky  Boswell,  "  I  cannot  think  Mr.  Gar- 
rick  would  grudge  such  a  trifle  to  you."  "  Sir,"  replied 
Johnson  sternly,  "  I  have  known  David  Garrick  longer 
than  you  have  done,  and  I  know  no  right  you  have  to 
talk  to  me  on  the  subject."  The  second  blow  might  have 
crushed  a  less  intrepid  curiosity.  Boswell,  though  silenced, 
gradually  recovered  sufficiently  to  listen,  and  afterwards 
to  note  down  parts  of  the  conversation.  As  the  interview 
went  on,  he  even  ventured  to  make  a  remark  or  two,  which 
were  very  civilly  received  ;  Davies  consoled  him  at  his 
departure  by  assuring  him  that  the  great  man  liked  him 
very  well.  "  I  cannot  conceive  a  more  humiliating  posi- 
tion," said  Beauclerk  on  another  occasion,  "than  to  be 
clapped  on  the  back  by  Tom  Davies."  For  the  present, 
however,  even  Tom  Davies  was  a  welcome  encourager  to 
one  who,  for  the  rest,  was  not  easily  rebuffed.  A  few 
days  afterwards  Boswell  ventured  a  call,  was  kindly  re- 
ceived and  detained  for  some  time  by  "  the  giant  in  his 
den."  He  was  still  a  little  afraid  of  the  said  giant,  who 
had  shortly  before  administered  a  vigorous  retort  to  his 


100  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

countryman  Blair.  Blair  had  asked  Johnson  whether  he 
thought  that  any  man  of  a  modern  age  could  have  -written 
Ossian.  "  Yes,  sir,"  replied  Johnson,  "  many  men,  many 
women,  and  many  children."  Boswell,  however,  got  on 
very  well,  and  before  long  had  the  high  honour  of  drinking 
a  bottle  of  port  with  Johnson  at  the  Mitre,  and  receiving, 
after  a  little  autobiographical  sketch,  the  emphatic  ap- 
proval, "  Give  me  your  hand,  I  have  taken  a  liking  to 
you." 

In  a  very  short  time  Boswell  was  on  sufficiently  easy 
terms  with  Johnson,  not  merely  to  frequent  his  levees  but 
to  a&k  him  to  dinner  at  the  Mitre.  He  gathered  up, 
though  without  the  skill  of  his  later  performances,  some 
fragments  of  the  conversational  feast.  The  great  man 
aimed  another  blow  or  two  at  Scotch  prejudices.  To  an 
unlucky  compatriot  of  Boswell's,  who  claimed  for  his  coun- 
try a  great  many  "  noble  wild  prospects,"  Johnson  replied, 
"  I  believe,  sir,  you  have  a  great  many,  Norway,  too,  has 
noble  wild  prospects  ;  and  Lapland  is  remarkable  for  pro- 
digious noble  wild  prospects.  But,  sir,  let  me  tell  you  the 
noblest  prospect  which  a  Scotchman  ever  sees,  is  the  high 
road  that  leads  him  to  England."  Though  Boswell  makes  a 
slight  remonstrance  about  the  "  rude  grandeur  of  Mature  " 
as  seen  in  "  Caledonia,"  he  sympathized  in  this  with  his 
teacher.  Johnson  said  afterwards,  that  he  never  knew  any 
one  with  "  such  a  gust  for  London."  Before  long  he  was 
trying  BoswelTs  tastes  by  asking  him  in  Greenwich  Park, 
"  Is  not  this  very  fine  1"  "  Yes,  sir,"  replied  the  promising 
disciple,  "  but  not  equal  to  Fleet  Street."  "  You  are  right, 
sir,"  said  the  sage ;  and  Boswell  illustrates  his  dictum  by 
the  authority  of  a  "  very  fashionable  baronet,"  and,  more- 
over, a  baronet  from  Eydal,  who  declared  that  the  fragrance 
of  a  May  evening  in  the  country  might  be  very  well,  but 


iv.]  JOUNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  101 

that  he  preferred  the  smell  of  a  flambeau  at  the  playhouse. 
In  more  serious  moods  Johnson  delighted  his  new  disciple 
by  discussions  upon  theological,  social,  and  literary  topics. 
He  argued  with  an  unfortunate  friend  of  BoswelTs,  whose 
mind,  it  appears,  had  "been  poisoned  by  Hume,  and  who 
was,  moreover,  rash  enough  to  undertake  the  defence  of 
principles  of  political  equality.  Johnson's  view  of  all 
propagators  of  new  opinions  was  tolerably  simple.  "  Hume, 
and  other  sceptical  innovators,"  he  said,  "  are  vain  men, 
and  will  gratify  themselves  at  any  expense.  Truth  will 
not  afford  sufficient  food  to  their  vanity ;  so  they  have 
betaken  themselves  to  error.  Truth,  sir,  is  a  cow  which 
will  yield  such  people  no  more  milk,  and  so  they  are  gone 
to  milk  the  bull."  On  another  occasion  poor  Boswell, 
not  yet  acquainted  with  the  master's  prejudices,  quoted 
with  hearty  laughter  a  "  very  strange  "  story  which  Hume 
had  told  him  of  Johnson.  According  to  Hume,  Johnson 
had  said  that  he  would  stand  before  a  battery  of  cannon 
to  restore  Convocation  to  its  full  powers.  "  And  would  I 
not,  sir?"  thundered  out  the  sage  with  flashing  eyes  and 
threatening  gestures.  Boswell  judiciously  bowed  to  the 
storm,  and  diverted  Johnson's  attention.  Another  mani- 
festation of  orthodox  prejudice  Avas  less  terrible.  Boswell 
told  Johnson  that  he  had  heard  a  Quaker  woman  preach. 
"  A  woman's  preaching,"  said  Johnson,  "  is  like  a  dog's 
walking  on  his  hind  legs.  It  is  not  done  well ;  but  you 
are  surprised  to  find  it  done  at  all." 

So  friendly  had  the  pair  become,  that  when  Boswell  left 
England  to  continue  his  studies  at  Utrecht,  Johnson  accom- 
panied him  in  the  stage-coach  to  Harwich,  amusing  him 
on  the  way  by  his  frankness  of  address  to  fellow-passen- 
gers, and  by  the  voracity  of  his  appetite.  He  gave  him 
some  excellent  advice,  remarking  of  a  moth  which  Ilut- 


102  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

tered  into  a  candle,  "  that  creature  was  its  own  tormentor, 
and  I  believe  its  name  was  Bos  well."  He  refuted  Berkeley 
by  striking  his  foot  with  mighty  force  against  a  large 
stone,  till  he  rebounded  from  it.  As  the  ship  put  out  to 
sea  Boswell  watched  him  from  the  deck,  whilst  he  remained 
"rolling  his  majestic  frame  in  his  usual  manner."  And 
so  the  friendship  was  cemented,  though  Boswell  disap- 
peared for  a  time  from .  the  scene,  travelled  on  the  Conti- 
nent, and  visited  Paoli  in  Corsica.  A  friendly  letter  or  two 
kept  up  the  connexion  till  Boswell  returned  in  1766,  with 
his  head  full  of  Corsica  and  a  projected  book  of  travels. 

In  the  next  year,  1767,  occurred  an  incident  upon  which 
Boswell  dwells  with  extreme  complacency.  Johnson  was 
in  the  habit  of  sometimes  reading  in  the  King's  Library, 
and  it  came  into  the  head  of  his  majesty  that  he  should 
like  to  see  the  uncouth  monster  upon  whom  he  had  be- 
stowed a  pension.  In  spite  of  his  semi-humorous  Jacobi- 
tism,  there  was  probably  not  a  more  loyal  subject  in  his 
majesty's  dominions.  Loyalty  is  a  word  too  often  used 
to  designate  a  sentiment  worthy  only  of  valets,  advertising 
tradesmen,  and  writers  of  claptrap  articles.  But  it  deserves 
all  respect  when  it  reposes,  as  in  Johnson's  case,  upon  a 
profound  conviction  of  the  value  of  political  subordina- 
tion, and  an  acceptance  of  the  king  as  the  authorized 
representative  of  a  great  principle.  There  was  no  touch  of 
servility  in  Johnson's  respect  for  his  sovereign,  a  respect 
fully  reconcilable  with  a  sense  of  his  own  personal  dignity. 
Johnson  spoke  of  his  interview  with  an  unfeigned  satisfac- 
tion, which  it  would  be  difficult  in  these  days  to  preserve 
from  the  taint  of  snobbishness.  He  described  it  frequently 
to  his^friends,  and  Boswell  with  pious  care  ascertained 
the  details  from  Johnson  himself,  and  from  various  secon- 
dary sources.  He  contrived  afterwards  to  get  his  minute 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  103 

submitted  to  the  King  himself,  who  graciously  authorized 
its  publication.  When  he  was  preparing  his  biography, 
he  published  this  account  with  the  letter  to  Chesterfield 
in  a  small  pamphlet  sold  at  a  prohibitory  price,  in  order 
to  secure  the  copyright. 

"  I  find,"  said  Johnson  afterwards,  "  that  it  does  a  man 
good  to  be  talked  to  by  his  sovereign.  In  the  first  place 
a  man  cannot  be  in  a  passion."  "What  other  advantages 
he  perceived  must  be  unknown,  for  here  the  oracle  was 
interrupted.  liut  whatever  the  advantages,  it  could 
hardly  be  reckoned  amongst  them,  that  there  would  be 
room  for  the  hearty  cut  and  thrust  retorts  which  enlivened 
his,  ordinary  talk.  To  us  accordingly  the  'conversation  is 
chiefly  interesting  as  illustrating  what  Johnson  meant  by 
his  politeness.  He  found  that  the  King  wanted  him  to 
talk,  and  he  talked  accordingly.  He  spoke  in  a  "firm 
manly  manner,  with  a  sonorous  voice,"  and  not  in  tho 
subdued  tone  customary  at  formal  receptions.  He  dilated 
upon  various  literary  topics,  on  the  libraries  of  Oxford 
and  Cambridge,  on  some  contemporary  controversies,  on 
the  quack  Dr.  Hill,  and  upon  the  reviews  of  the  day.  All 
that  is  worth  repeating  is  a  complimentary  passage  which 
shows  Johnson's  possession  of  that  courtesy  which  rests 
upon  sense  and  self-respect.  The  King  asked  whether  he 
was  writing  anything,  and  Johnson  excused  himself  by 
saying  that  he  had  told  the  world  what  he  knew  for  the 
present,  and  had  "  done  his  part  as  a  writer. 'V  "  I  should 
have  thought  so  too,"  said  the  King,  "  if  you  had  not 
written  so  well."  "  No  man,"  said  Johnson,  "  could  have 
paid  a  higher  compliment ;  and  it  was  fit  for  a  King  to 
pay — it  was  decisive."  When  asked  if  he  had  replied,  he 
said,  "  Ko,  sir.  When  the  King  had  said  it,  it  was  to  be. 
It  was  not  for  me  to  bandy  civilities  with  my  sovereign." 


104  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Johnson  was  not  the  less  delighted.  "  Sir,"  he  said  to 
the  librarian,  "  they  may  talk  of  the  King  as  they  will, 
but  he  is  the  finest  gentleman  I  have  ever  seen."  And 
he  afterwards  compared  his  manners  to  those  of  Louis 
XIV.,  and  his  favourite,  Charles  II.  Goldsmith,  says 
Boswell,  was  silent  during  the  narrative,  because  (so  his 
kind  friend  supposed)  he  was  jealous  of  the  honour  paid 
to  the  dictator.  But  his  natural  simplicity  prevailed.  He 
ran  to  Johnson,  and  exclaimed  in  'a  kind  of  flutter,' 
"  Well,  you  acquitted  yourself  in  this  conversation  better 
than  I  should  have  done,  for  I  should  have  bowed  and 
stammered  through  the  whole  of  it." 

The  years  1768  and  1769  were  a  period  of  great  excite- 
.ment  for  Boswell.  He  was  carrying  on  various  love 
affairs,  which  ended  with  his  marriage  in  the  end  of  1769. 
He  was-  publishing  his  book  upon  Corsica  and  paying 
homage  to  Paoli,  who  arrived  in  England  in  the  autumn 
of  the  same  year.  The  book  appeared  in  the  beginning  of 
1768,  and  he  begs  his  friend  Temple  to  report  all  that  is 
said  about  it,  but  with  the  restriction  that  he  is  to  conceal 
all  censure.  He  particularly  wanted  Gray's  opinion,  as  Gray 
was  a  friend  of  Temple's.  Gray's  opinion,  not  conveyed 
to  Boswell,  was  expressed  by  his  calling  it  "a  dialogue 
between  a  green  goose  and  a  hero."  Boswell,  who  was  culti- 
vating the  society  of  various  eminent  people,  exclaims 
triumphantly  in  a  letter  to  Temple  (April  26,  1 768),  "  I  am 
really  the  great  man  now."  Johnson  and  Hume  had  called 
upon  him  on  the  same  day,  and  Garrick,  Franklin,  and  Ogle- 
thorpe  also  partook  of  his  "  admirable  dinners  and  good 
claret."  "  This,"  he  says,  with  the  sense  that  he  deserved 
his  honours,  "  is  enjoying  the  fruit  of  my  labours,  and 
appearing  like  the  friend  of  Paoli."  Johnson  in  vain 
expressed  a  wish  that  he  would  "empty  his  head  of 


IV.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  103 

Corsica,  which  had  filled  it  too  long."  "  Empty  my  head 
of  Corsica  !  Empty  it  of  honour,  empty  it  of  friendship, 
empty  it  of  piety  !"  exclaims  the  ardent  youth.  The  next 
year  accordingly  saw  Boswell's  appearance  at  the  Stratford 
Jubilee,  where  he  paraded  to  the  admiration  of  all  beholders 
in  a  costume  described  by  himself  (apparently)  in  a  glow- 
ing article  in  the  London  Magazine.  "  Is  it  wrong,  sir," 
he  took  speedy  opportunity  of  inquiring  from  the  oracle, 
"to  affect  singularity  in  order  to  make  people  stare?" 
"  Yes,"  replied  Johnson,  "  if  you  do  it  by  propagating 
error,  and  indeed  it  is  wrong  in  any  way.  There  is  in 
human  nature  a  general  inclination  to  make  people  stare, 
and  every  wise  man  has  himself  to  cure  of  it,  and  does 
cure  himself.  If  you  wish  to  make  people  stare  by  doing 
better  than  others,  why  make  them  stare  till  they  store 
their  eyes  out.  But  consider  how  easy  it  is  to  make 
people  stare  by  being  absurd  " — a  proposition  which  he 
proceeds  to  illustrate  by  examples  perhaps  less  telling  than 
Boswell's  recent  performance. 

The  sage  was  less  communicative  on  the  question  of 
marriage,  though  Boswell  had  anticipated  some  "  instruc- 
tive conversation  "  upon  that  topic.  His  sole  remark  was 
one  from  which  Boswell  "  humbly  differed."  Johnson 
maintained  that  a  wife  was  not  the  worse  for  being 
learned.  Boswell,  on  the  other  hand,  defined  the  proper 
degree  of  intelligence  to  be  desired  in  a  female  companion 
by  some  verses  in  which  Sir  Thomas  Overbury  says  that 
a  wife  should  have  some  knowledge,  and  be  "  by  nature 
wise,  not  learned  much  by  art."  Johnson  said  afterwards 
that  Mrs.  Boswell  was  in  a  proper  degree  inferior  to  her 
husband.  So  far  as  we  can  tell,  she  seems  to  have 
been  a  really  sensible  and  good  woman,  who  kept  her 
husband's  absurdities  in  check,  and  was,  in  her  way, 


06  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

u,  better  wife  than  he  deserved.    So,  happily,  aro  most 
vives. 

Johnson  and  Boswell  had  several  meetings  in  17G9. 
Boswell  had  the  honour  of  introducing  the  two  ob- 
jects of  his  idolatry,  Johnson  and  Paoli,  and  on  another 
occasion  entertained  a  party  including  Goldsmith  and 
Garrick  and  Eeynolds,  at  his  lodgings  in  Old  Bond  Street. 
We  can  still  see  the  meeting  more  distinctly  than  many 
ihat  have  been  swallowed  by  a  few  days  of  oblivion.  They 
waited  for  one  of  the  party,  Johnson  kindly  maintaining 
Uiat  six  ought  to  be  kept  waiting  for  one,  if  the  one 
rould  suffer  more  by  the  others  sitting  down  than  the 
jix  by  \vaiting.  Meanwhile  Garrick  "  played  round 
Johnson  with  a  fond  vivacity,  taking  hold  of  the 
breasts  of  his  coat,  looking  up  in  his  face  with  a  lively 
archness,"  and  complimenting  him  on  his  good  health. 
Goldsmith  strutted  about  bragging  of  his  dress,  of  which 
Boswell,  in  the  serene  consciousness  of  superiority  to  such 
weakness,  thought  him  seriously  vain.  "  Let  me  tell 
you,"  said  Goldsmith,  "  when  my  tailor  brought  home  my 
bloom-coloured  coat,  he  said,  'Sir,  I  have  a  favour  to 
beg  of  you ;  wheii  anybody  asks  you  who  made  your 
clothes,  be  pleased  to  mention  John  Filby,  at  the  Harrow, 
Water  Lane.'"  "Why,  sir,"  said  Johnson,  "that  was 
because  he  knew  that  the  strange  colour  would  attract 
crowds  to  gaze  at  it,  and  thus  they  might  hear  of  him,  and 
see  how  well  he  could  make  a  coat  even  of  so  absurd  a 
colour."  Mr.  Filby  has  gone  the  way  of  all  tailors  and 
bloom- coloured  coats,  but  some  of  his  bills  are  preserved. 
On  the  day  of  this  dinner  he  had  delivered  to  Goldsmith 
a  half-dress  suit  of  ratteen  lined  with  satin,  costing 
twelve  guineas,  a  pair  of  silk  stocking-breeches  for  £2  5s. 
and  a  pair  of  bloom-coloured  ditto-  for  £1  4s.  Gd.  Tho 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  107 

bill,  including  other  items,  was  paid,  it  is  satisfactory  to 
add,  in  February,  1771. 

The  conversation  was  chiefly  literary.  Johnson  re- 
peated the  concluding  lines  of  the  Dunciad ;  upon  which 
some  one  (probably  Boswell)  ventured  to  say  that  they  were 
"  too  fine  for  such  a  poem — a  poem  on  what  ?  "  "  Why," 
said  Johnson,  "  on  dunces !  It  was  worth  while  being 
a  dunce  then.  Ah,  sir,  hadst  ihou  lived  in  those  days  ! " 
Johnson  previously  uttered  a  criticism  which  has  led 
some  people  to  think  that  he  had  a  touch  of  the  dunce 
in  him.  He  declared  that  a  description  of  a  temple  in 
Congreve's  Mourning  Bride  was  the  finest  he  knew — 
finer  than  anything  in  Shakspeare.  Garrick  vainly 
protested ;  but  Johnson  was  inexorable.  He  compared 
Congreve  to  a  man  who  had  only  ten  guineas  in  the  world, 
but  all  in  one  coin ;  whereas  Shakspeare  might  have  ten 
thousand  separate  guineas.  The  principle  of  the  criticism 
is  rather  curious.  "  What  I  mean  is,"  said  Johnson,  "  that 
you  can  show  me  no  passage  where  there  is  simply  a 
description  of  material  objects,  without  any  admixture 
of  moral  notions,  which  produces  such  an  effect."  The 
description  of  the  night  before  Agincourt  was  rejected 
because  there  were  men  in  it;  and  the  description  of 
Dover  Cliff  because  the  boats  and  the  crows  "  impede  yon 
fall."  They  do  "not  impress  your  mind  at  once  with 
the  horrible  idea  of  immense  height.  The  impression  is 
divided ;  you  pass  on  by  computation  from  one  stage  of 
the  tremendous  space  to  another." 

Probably  most  people  will  think  that  the  passage  in 
question  deserves  a  very  slight  fraction  of  the  praise  be- 
stowed upon  it;  but  the  criticism,  like  most  of  Johnson's, 
has  a  meaning  which  might  be  worth  examining  ab- 
stractedly from  the  special  application  which  shocks  tho 


108  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

idolaters  of  Shakspeare.  Presently  the  party  discussed 
Mrs.  Montagu,  whose  Essay  upon  Shakspeare  had  made 
some  noise.  Johnson  had  a  respect  for  her,  caused  in 
great  measure  by  a  sense  of  her  liberality  to  his  friend  Miss 
"Williams,  of  -whom  more  must  be  said  hereafter.  He 
paid  her  some  tremendous  compliments,  observing  that 
some  China  plates  which  had  belonged  to  Queen  Elizabeth 
and  to  her,  had  no  reason  to  be  ashamed  of  a  possessor  so 
little  inferior  to  the  first.  But  he  had  his  usual  profes- 
sional contempt  for  her  amateur  performances  in  literature. 
Her  defence  of  Shakspeare  against  Voltaire  did  her  honour, 
he  admitted,  but  it  would  do  nobody  else  honour.  "  No, 
sir,  there  is  no  real  criticism  in  it:  none  showing  the 
beauty  of  thought,  as  formed  on  the  workings  of  the  human 
heart."  Mrs.  Montagu  was  reported  once  to  have  com- 
plimented a  modern  tragedian,  probably  Jephson,  by  say- 
ing, "I  tremble  for  Shakspeare."  "When  Shakspeare,"  said 
Johnson,  "has  got  Jephson  for  his  rival  and  Mrs.  Montagu 
for  his  defender,  he  is  in  a  poor  state  indeed."  The  conver- 
sation went  on  to  a  recently  published  book,  Kames's 
Elements  of  Criticism,  which  Johnson  praised,  whilst  Gold- 
smith said  more  truly,  "  It  is  easier  to  write  that  book  than 
to  read  it."  Johnson  went  on  to  speak  of  other  critics. 
"  There  is  no  great  merit,"  he  said,  "  in  telling  how  many 
plays  have  ghosts  in  them,  and  how  this  ghost  is  better 
than  that.  You  must  show  how  terror  is  impressed  on  the 
human  heart.  In  the  description  of  night  in  Macleth  the 
beetle  arid  the  bat  detract  from  the  general  idea  of  dark- 
ness— inspissated  gloom." 

After  Boswell's   marriage   he   disappeared    for     some 
"time  from  London,  and  his  correspondence  with  Johnson 
dropped,  as  he  says,  without  coldness,  from  pure  procras- 
tination.    He  did  not  return  to  London  till  1772.     In  the 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  109 

spring  of  that  and  the  following  year  he  renewed  his  old 
habits  of  intimacy,  and  inquired  into  Johnson's  opinion  upon 
various  subjects  ranging  from  ghosts  to  literary  criticism. 
Tho  height  to  which  he  had  risen  in  the  doctor's  good 
opinion  was  marked  by  several  symptoms.  He  was  asked 
to  dine  at  Johnson's  house  upon  Easter  day,  1773;  and 
observes  that  his  curiosity  was  as  much  gratified  as  by  a 
previous  dinner  with  Rousseau  in  the  "  wilds  of  Neuf- 
chatel."  He  was  now  able  to  report,  to  the  amazement  of 
many  inquirers,  that  Johnson's  establishment  was  quite 
orderly.  The  meal  consisted  of  very  good  soup,  a  boiled 
leg  of  lamb  with  spinach,  a  veal  pie,  and  a  rice  pudding. 
A  stronger  testimony  of  good-will  was  his  election,  by 
Johnson's  influence,  into  the  Club.  It  ought  apparently 
to  be  said  that  Johnson  forced  him  upon  the  Club  by 
letting  it  be  understood  that,  till  Boswell  was  admitted, 
no  other  candidate  would  have  a  chance.  Boswell,  how- 
ever, was,  as  his  proposer  said,  a  thoroughly  "  clubable " 
man,  and  once  a  member,  his  good  humour  secured  his 
popularity.  On  the  important  evening  Boswell  dined  at 
Beauclerk's  with  his  proposer  and  some  other  members. 
The  talk  turned  upon  Goldsmith's  merits ;  and  Johnson 
not  only  defended  his  poetry,  but  preferred  him  as  a  his- 
torian to  Robertson.  Such  a  judgment  could  bo  explained 
in  Boswell's  opinion  by  nothing  but  Johnson's  dislike  to 
the  Scotch.  Once  before,  when  Boswell  had  mentioned 
Robertson  in  order  to  meet  Johnson's  condemnation  of 
Scotch  literature  in  general,  Johnson  had  evaded  him ; 
"  Sir,  I  love  Robertson,  and  I  won't  talk  of  his  book."  On 
the  present  occasion  he  said  that  he  would  give  to  Robert- 
son the  advice  offered  by  an  old  college  tutor  to  a  pupil ; 
"  read  over  your  compositions,  and  whenever  you  meet  with 
a  passage  which  you  think  particularly  fine,  strike  it  out." 


110  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CBAP. 

A  good  anecdote  of  Goldsmith  followed.  Johnson  had 
said  to  him  once  in  the  Poet's  Corner  at  Westminster, — 

Forsitan  efc  nostrum  nomcn  miscebitur  istis. 

When  they  got  to  Temple  Bar  Goldsmith  pointed  to  the 
heads  of  the  Jacobites  upon  it  and  slily  suggested, — 

Forsitan  et  nostrum  nomen  miscebitur  istis. 

i  Johnson  next  pronounced  a  critical  judgment  which  should 
be  set  against  many  sins  of  that  kind.  He  praised  the 
Pilgrim's  Proyressvery  warmly,  and  suggested  that  Bunyan 
had  probably  read  Spenser. 

After  more  talk  the  gentlemen  went  to  the  Club ;  and 
poor  Boswell  remained  trembling  with  an  anxiety  which 
even  the  charms  of  Lady  Di  Beauclerk's  conversation  could 
not  dissipate.  The  welcome  news  of  his  election  was 
brought ;  and  Boswell  went  to  see  Burke  for  the  first  time, 
and  to  receive  a  humorous  charge  from  Johnson,  pointing 
out  the  conduct  expected  from  him  as  a  good  member. 
Perhaps  some  hints  were  given  as  to  betrayal  of  confidence. 
Boswell  seems  at  any  rate  to  have  had  a  certain  reserve  in 
repeating  Club  talk. 

This  intimacy  with  Johnson  was  about  to  receive  a  more 
public  and  even  more  impressive  stamp.  The  antipathy 
to  Scotland  and  the  Scotch  already  noticed  was  one  of 
Johnson's  most  notorious  crotchets.  The  origin  of  the  pre- 
judice was  forgotten  by  Johnson  himself,  though  he  was 
willing  to  accept  a  theory  started  by  old  Sheridan  that  it 
was  resentment  for  the  betrayal  of  Charles  I.  There  is, 
however,  nothing  surprising  in  Johnson's  partaking  a  pre- 
judice common  enough  from  the  days  of  his  youth,  when 
each  people  supposed  itself  to  have  been  cheated  by  the 


IV.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  Ill 

Union,  and  Englishmen  resented  the  advent  of  swarms  of 
needy  adventurers,  talking  with  a  strange  accent  and  hang- 
ing together  with  honourable  but  vexatious  persistence. 
Johnson  was  irritated  by  what  was,  after  all,  a  natural  de- 
fence against  English  prejudice.  He  declared  that  the 
Scotch  were  always  ready  to  lie  on  each  other's  behalf. 
"  The  Irish,"  he  said,  "  are  not  in  a  conspiracy  to  cheat  the 
world  by  false  representations  of  the  merits  of  their  country- 
men. Nq^  sir,  the  Irish  are  a  fair  people ;  they  never  speak 
well  of  one  another."  There  was  another  difference.  He 
always  expressed  a  generous  resentment  against  the  tyranny 
exercised  by  English  rulers  over  the  Irish  people.  To  some 
one  who  defended  the  restriction  of  Irish  trade  for  the 
good  of  English  merchants,  he  said,  "  Sir,  you  talk  the 
language  of  a  savage.  What !  sir,  would  you  prevent  any 
people  from  feeding  themselves,  if  by  any  honest  means 
they  can  do  it  ] "  It  was  "  better  to  hang  or  drown  people, 
at  once,"  than  weaken  them  by  unrelenting  persecution. 
He  felt  some  tenderness  for  Catholics,  especially  when 
oppressed,  and  a  hearty  antipathy  towards  prosperous  Pres- 
byterians. The  Lowland  Scotch  were  typified  by  John 
Knox,  in  regard  to  whom  he  expressed  a  hope,  after  view- 
ing the  ruins  of  St.  Andrew's,  that  he  was  buried  "  in  the 
highway." 

This  sturdy  British  and  High  Church  prejudice  did  not 
prevent  the  worthy  doctor  from  having  many  warm  friend- 
ships with  Scotchmen,  and  helping  many  distressed  Scotch- 
men in  London.  Most  of  the  amanuenses  employed  for 
his  Dictionary  were  Scotch.  But  he  nourished  the  pre- 
judice the  more  as  giving  an  excellent  pretext  for  many 
keen  gibes.  "  Scotch  learning,"  he  said,  for  example,  "  is 
like  bread  in  a  besieged  town.  Every  man  gets  a  mouth- 
ful, but  no  man  a  bellyful."  Once  Strahan  said  in  an- 


112  SAMUEL  JOHNSON. 

swer  to  some  abusive  remarks,  "Well,  sir,  God  made 
Scotland."  "  Certainly,"  replied  Johnson,  "  but  we  must 
always  remember  that  He  made  it  for  Scotchmen ;  and 
comparisons  are  odious,  Mr.  Strahan,  but  God  made  hell." 
Boswell,  therefore,  had  reason  to  feel  both  triumph  and 
alarm  when  he  induced*  the  great  man  to  accompany  him 
in  a  Scotch  tour.  Boswell's  journal  of  the  tour  appeared 
soon  after  Johnson's  death.  Johnson  himself  wrote  an 
account  of  it,  which  is  not  without  interest,  though  it  is 
in  his  dignified  style,  which  does  not  condescend  to  Bos- 
wellian  touches  of  character.  In  1773  the  Scotch  High- 
lands were  still  a  little  known  region,  justifying  a  book 
descriptive  of  manners  and  customs,  and  touching  upon 
antiquities  now  the  commonplaces  of  innumerable  guide 
books.  Scott  was  still  an  infant,  and  the  day  of  enthu- 
siasm, real  or  affected,  for  mountain  scenery  had  not  yet 
dawned.  Neither  of  the  travellers,  as  Boswell  remarks, 
cared  much  for  "  rural  beauties."  Johnson  says  quaintly 
on  the  shores  of  Loch  Ness,  "  It  will  very  readily  occur 
that  this  uniformity  of  barrenness  can  afford  very  little 
amusement  to  the  traveller ;  that  it  is  easy  to  sit  at  home 
and  conceive  rocks  and  heath  and  waterfalls ;  and  that 
these  journeys  are  useless  labours,  which  neither  impreg- 
nate the  imagination  nor  enlarge  the  understanding."  And 
though  he  shortly  afterwards  sits  down  on  a  bank  "  such 
as  a  writer  of  romance  might  have  delighted  to  feign,"  and 
there  conceived  the  thought  of  his  book,  he  does  not  seem 
to  have  felt  much  enthusiasm.  He  checked  Boswell  for 
describing  a  hill  as  "  immense,"  and  told  him  that  it  was 
only  a  "considerable  protuberance."  Indeed  it  is  not 
surprising  if  he  sometimes  grew  weary  in  long  rides  upon. 
Highland  ponies,  or  if,  when  weatherbound  in  a  remote  vil- 
lage in  Skye,  he  declared  that  this  was  a  "  waste  of  life." 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  113 

On  the  whole,  however,  Johnson  bore  his  fatigues  well, 
preserved  his  temper,  and  made  sensible  remarks  upon 
men  and  things.  The  pair  started  from  Edinburgh  in 
the  middle  of  August,  1773  ;  they  went  north  along  the 
eastern  coast,  through  St.  Andrew's,  Aberdeen,  Banff, 
Fort  George,  and  Inverness.  There  they  took  to  horses, 
rode  to  Glenelg,  and  took  boat  for  Skye,  where  they  landed 
on  the  2nd  of  September.  They  visited  Rothsay,  Col, 
Mull,  and  lona,  and  after  some  dangerous  sailing  got  to 
the  mainland  at  Oban  on  October  2nd.  Thence  they  pro- 
ceeded by  Inverary  and  Loch  Lomond  to  Glasgow ;  and 
after  paying  a  visit  to  Boswell's  paternal  mansion  at 
Auchinleck  in  Ayrshire,  returned  to  Edinburgh  in  Novem- 
ber. It  were  too  long  to  narrate  their  adventures  at 
length,  or  to  describe  in  detail  how  Johnson  grieved  over 
traces  of  the  iconoclastic  zeal  of  Knox's  disciples,  seri- 
ously investigated  stories  of  second-sight,  cross-examined 
and  brow-beat  credulous  believers  in  the  authenticity  of 
Ossian,  and  felt  his  piety  grow  warm  among  the  ruins 
of  lona.  Once  or  twice,  when  the  temper  of  the  travellers 
was  tried  by  the  various  worries  incident  to  their  position, 
poor  Boswell  came  in  for  some  severe  blows.  But  he 
was  happy,  feeling,  as  he  remarks,  like  a  dog  who  has  run 
away  with  a  large  piece  of  meat,  and  is  devouring  it 
peacefully  in  a  eorner  by  himself.  Boswell's  spirits  were 
irrepressible.  On  hearing  a  drum  beat  for  dinner  at 
Fort  George,  he  says,  with  a  Pepys-like  touch,  "  I  for  a 
little  while  fancied  myself  a  military  man,  and  it  pleased 
me."  He  got  scandalously  drunk  on  one  occasion,  and 
showed  reprehensible  levity  on  others.  He  bored  Johnson 
by  inquiring  too  curiously  into  his  reasons  for  not  wear- 
ing a  nightcap — a  subject  which  seems  to  have  interested 
him  profoundly;  he  permitted  himself  to  say  in  his 

6 


114  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

journal  that  he  was  so  much  pleased  with  some  pretty 
ladies'  maids  at  the  Duke  of  Argyll's,  that  he  felt  he  could 
"  have  been  a  knight-errant  for  them,"  and  his  "  venerable 
fellow-traveller "  read  the  passage  without  censuring  his 
levity.  The  great  man  himself  could  be  equally  volatile. 
"I  have  often  thought"  he  observed  one  day,  to  Boswcll's 
amusement,  "  that  if  I  kept  a  seraglio,  the  ladies  should 
all  wear  linen  gowns  " — as  more  cleanly.  The  pair  agreed 
in  trying  to  stimulate  the  feudal  zeal  of  various  Highland 
chiefs  with  whom  they  came  in  contact,  and  who  were 
unreasonable  enough  to  show  a  hankering  after  the  luxuries 
of  civilization. 

Though  Johnson  seems  to  have  been  generally  on  his 
best  behaviour,  he  had  a  rough  encounter  or  two  with 
some  of  the  more  civilized  natives.  Boswell  piloted  him 
safely  through  a  visit  to  Lord  Monboddo,  a  man  of  real 
ability,  though  the  proprietor  of  crochets  as  eccentric  as 
Johnson's,  and  consequently  divided  from  him  by  strong 
mutual  prejudices.  At  Auchinleck  he  was  less  fortunate. 
The  old  laird,  who  was  the  staunchest  of  "Whigs,  had  not 
relished  his  son's  hero-worship.  "  There  is  nae  hope  for 
Jamie,  mon ;  Jamie  is  gaen  clean  gyte.  What  do  you 
think,  mon  ?  He's  done  wi'  Paoli — he's  off  wi'  the  land- 
louping  scoundrel  of  a  Corsican,  and  who's  tail  do  you 
think  he's  pinned  himself  to  now,  mon?"  "  Here,"  says 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  the  authority  for  the  story,  "  the  old 
judge  summoned  up  a  sneer  of  most  sovereign  contempt. 
'  A  dominie,  mon — an  auld  dominie — he  keeped  a  schiilo 
and  caauld  it  an  acaademy.'"  The  two  managed  to 
keep  the  peace  till,  one  day  during  Johnson's  visit, 
they  got  upon  Oliver  Cromwell.  Boswell  suppresses 
the  scene  with  obvious  reluctance,  his  openness  being 
checked  for  onco  by  Blial  respect.  Scott  has  fortu- 


IV.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  113 

nately  preserved  the  climax  of  Old  Bo-swell's  argument. 
"What  had  Cromwell  done  for  his  country]"  asked 
Johnson.  "  God,  doctor,  he  gart  Kings  ken  that  they 
had  a  litli  in  their  necks"  retorted  the  laird,  in  a 
phrase  worthy  of  Mr.  Carlyle  himself.  Scott  reports  one 
other  scene,  at  which  respectable  commentators,  like 
Croker,  hold  up  their  hands  in  horror.  Should  we  regret 
or  rejoice  to  say  that  it  involves  an  obvious  inaccuracy  1 
The  authority,  however,  is  too  good  to  allow  us  to  suppose 
that  it  was  without  some  foundation.  Adam  Smith,  it  is 
said,  met  Johnson  at  Glasgow  and  had  an  altercation  with 
him  about  the  well-known  account  of  Hume's  death.  As 
Hume  did  not  die  till  three  years  later,  there  must  be 
some  error  in  this.  The  dispute,  however,  whatever  its 
date  or  subject,  ended  by  Johnson  saying  to  Smith,  "  You 
lie"  "  And  what  did  "you  reply  ? "  was  asked  of  Smith. 

"  I  said,  '  you  are  a  son  of  a ."     "  On  such  terms," 

says  Scott,  "  did  these  two  great  moralists  meet  and  part, 
and  such  was  the  classical  dialogue  between  these  two 
great  teachers  of  morality." 

In  the  year  1774  Boswell  found  it  expedient  to  atone 
for  his  long  absence  in  the  previous  year  by  staying  at 
home.  Johnson  managed  to  complete  his  account  of  ihe 
Scotch  Tour,  which  was  published  at  the  end  of  the  year. 
Among  other  consequences  was  a  violent  controversy 
with  the  lovers  of  Ossian,  Johnson  was  a  thorough  scep- 
tic as  to  the  authenticity  of  the  book.  His  scepticism 
did  not  repose  upon  the  philological  or  antiquarian  reason- 
ings, which  would  be  applicable  in  the  controversy  from 
internal  evidence.  It  was  to  some  extent  the  expression  of 
a  general  incredulity  which  astonished  his  friends,  espe- 
cially when  contrasted  with  his  tenderness  for  many  puerile 
superstitions.  He  could  scarcely  be  induced  to  admit  the 


116  SAMDEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

truth  of  any  narrative  which,  struck  him  as  odd,  and  it 
was  long,  for  example,  before  he  would  believe  even  in  the 
Lisbon  earthquake.  Yet  he  seriously  discussed  the  truth 
of  second-sight ;  he  carefully  investigated  the  Cock-lane 
ghost — a  goblin  who  anticipated  some  of  the  modern  phe- 
nomena of  so-called  "  spiritualism,"  and  with  almost  equal 
absurdity ;  he  told  stories  to  Boswell  about  a  "  shadowy 
being "  which  had  once  been  seen  by  Cave,  and  declared 
that  he  had  once  heard  his  mother  call  "  Sam  "  when  he 
was  at  Oxford  and  she  at  Lichfield.  The  apparent  incon- 
sistency was  in  truth,  natural  enough.  Any  man  who 
clings  with  unreasonable  pertinacity  to  the  prejudices  of 
his  childhood,  must  be  alternately  credulous  and  sceptical 
in  excess.  In  both  cases,  he  judges  by  his  fancies  in  de- 
fiance of  evidence ;  and  accepts  and  rejects  according  to 
his  likes  and  dislikes,  instead  of  his  estimates  of  logical 
proof.  Ossian  would  be  naturally  offensive  to  Johnson, 
as  one  of  the  earliest  and  most  remarkable  manifestations 
of  that  growing  t^ste  for  what  was  called  "  Mature,"  as 
opposed  to  civilization,  of  which  Ilousseau  was  the  great 
mouthpiece..  Nobody  more  heartily  despised  this  form  of 
"  cant "  than  Johnson.  A  man  who  utterly  despised  the 
scenery  of  the  Hebrides  as  compared  with  Greenwich 
Park  or  Charing  Cross,  would  hardly  take  kindly  to  the 
Ossianesque  version  of  the  mountain  passion.  The  book 
struck  him  as  sheer  rubbish.  I  have  already  quoted 
the  retort  about  "many  men,  many  women,  and  many 
children."  "A  man,"  he  said,  on  another  occasion, 
"  might  write  such  stuff  for  ever,  if  he  would  abandon  his 
mind  to  it." 

The  precise  point,  however,  upon  which  he  rested  his 
case^was  the  tangible  oife  of  the  inability  of  Macphcr.-ou 
to  produce  the  manuscripts  of  which  lie  had  affirmed  tho . 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITEEAEY  DICTATOR.  117 

existence,  Macpherson  wrote  a  furious  letter  to  Johnson, 
of  which  the  purport  can  only  "be  inferred  from  Johnson's 
smashing  retort, — 

"  Mr.  James  MacPherson,  I  have  received  your  foolish 
and  impudent  letter.  Any  violence  offered  me  I  shall  do 
my  best  to  repel ;  and  what  I  cannot  do  for  myself,  the 
law  shall  do  for  me.  I  hope  I  shall  never  be  deterred 
from  detecting  what  I  think  a  cheat  by  the  menaces  of 
a  ruffian. 

"  "What  would  you  have  me  retract  ?  I  thought  your 
book  an  imposture  :  I  think  it  an  imposture  still.  For 
this  opinion  I  have  given  my  reasons  to  the  public,  which 
I  here  dare  you  to  refute.  Your  rage  I  defy.  Your 
abilities,  since  your  Homer,  are  not  so  formidable ;  and 
what  I  hear  of  your  morals  inclines  me  to  pay  regard  not 
to  what  you  shall  say,  but  to  what  you  shall  prove. 
You  may  print  this  if  you  wilL 

"  SAM.  JOHNSON." 

And  so  laying  in  a  tremendous  cudgel,  the  old  gentle- 
nan  (he  was  now  sixty-six)  awaited  the  assault,  which, 
however,  was  not  delivered. 

In  1775  Boswell  again  came  to  London,  and  renewed 
some  of  the  Scotch  discussions.  He  attended  a  meeting 
of  the  Literary  Club,  and  found  the  members  disposed 
to  laugh  at  Johnson's  tenderness  to  the  stories  about 
second-sight.  Boswell  heroically  avowed  his  own  belief. 
"  The  evidence,"  ho  said,  "  is  enough  for  me,  though  not 
for  his  great  mind.  What  will  not  till  a  quart  bottle,  will 
fill  a  pint  bottle.  I  am  filled  with  belief."  "  Are  you  T 
said  Colman  ;  "  then  cork  it  up." 

It  was  during  this  and  the  next  few  years  that  Boswell 
laboured  most  successfully  in  gathering  materials  for  his 
book.  In  1777  he  only  met  Johnson  in  the  country.  In 


118  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

1779,  for  some  unexplained  reason,  he  was  lazy  in  making 
notes;  in  1780  and  1781  he  was  absent  from  London; 
and  in  the  following  year,  Johnson  was  visibly  declining. 
The  tenour  of  Johnson's  life  was  interrupted  during  this 
period  by  no  remarkable  incidents,  and  his  literary 
activity  was  not  great,  although  the  composition  of  the 
Lives  of  tlie  Poets  falls  between  1777  and  1780.  His 
mind,  however,  as  represented  by  his  talk,  was  in  full 
vigour.  I  will  take  in  order  of  time  a  few  of  the  passages 
recorded  by  Boswell,  which  may  serve  for  various  reasons 
to  afford  the  best  illustration  of  his  character.  Yet  it 
may  be  worth  while  once  more  to  repeat  the  warning 
that  such  fragments  moved  from  their  context  must  lose 
most  of  their  charm. 

On  March  26th  (1775),  Boswell  met  Johnson  at  the 
house  of  the  publisher,  Strahan.  Strahan  reminded  John- 
son of  a  characteristic  remark  which  he  had  formerly  made, 
that  there  are  "  few  ways  in  which  a  man  can  be  more 
innocently  employed  than  in  getting  money."  On  another 
occasion  Johnson  observed  with  equal  truth,  if  less 
originality,  that  cultivating  kindness  was  an  important 
part  of  life,  as  well  as  money-making.  Johnson  then 
asked  to  see  a  country  lad  whom  he  had  recommended  to 
Strahan  as  an  apprentice.  He  asked  for  five  guineas  on 
account,  that  he  might  give  one  to  the  boy.  "  Kay,  if  a 
man  recommends  a  boy  and  does  nothing  for  him,  it  is 
sad  work."  A  "  little,  thick  short-legged  boy  "  was  accord- 
ingly brought  into  the  courtyard,  whither  Johnson  and 
Boswell  descended,  and  the  lexicographer  bending  him- 
self down  administered  some  good  advice  to  the  awe- 
struck lad  with  "  slow  and  sonorous  solemnity,"  ending  by 
the  presentation  of  the  guinea. 

In  the  evening  the  pair  formed  part  of  a  corps  of  party 


rv.J  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  119 

"  wits,"  led  by  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds,  to  the  benefit  of  Mrs. 
Abington,  who  had  been  a  frequent  model  of  the  painter. 
Johnson  praised  Garrick's  prologues,  and  Boswell  kindly 
reported  the  eulogy  to  Garrick,  with  whom  he  supped  at 
Beauclerk's.  Garrick  treated  him  to  a  mimicry  of 
Johnson,  repeating,  "  with  pauses  and  half-whistling,"  the 
lines, — 

Os  homini  sublime  dedit— ccelumque  tneri 
Jussit — et  erectos  ad  sidera  tollere  vultus  : 

looking  downwards,  and  at  the  end  touching  tho  ground 
with  a  contorted  gesticulation.  Garrick  was  generally 
jealous  of  Johnson's  light  opinion  of  him,  and  used  to 
take  off  his  old  master,  saying,  "  Davy  has  some  convivial 
pleasantry  about  hiin,  but  'tis  a  futile  fellow." 

Next  day,  at  Thrales',  Johnson  fell  foul  of  Gray,  ono 
of  his  pet  aversions.  .Boswell  denied  that  Gray  was  dull 
in  poetry.  "Sir,"  replied  Johnson,  "he  was  dull  in 
company,  dull  in  his  closet,  dull  everywhere.  He  was 
dull  in  a  new  way,  and  that  made  people  think  him 
great.  He  was  a  mechanical  poet."  He  proceeded  to  say 
that  there  were  only  two  good  stanzas  in  the  Elegy. 
Johnson's  criticism  was  perverse;  but  if  we  were  to 
collect  a  few  of  the  judgments  passed  by  contemporaries 
upon  each  other,  it  would  be  scarcely  exceptional  in.  its. 
want  of  appreciation.  It  is  rather  odd  to  remark  that 
Gray  was  generally  condemned  for  obscurity — a  charge 
which  seems  strangely  out  of  place  when  he  is  measured  by 
more  recent,  standards. 

A  day  •  or  two  afterwards  some  one  rallied  Johnson  on 
his  appearance  at  Mrs.  Abington's  benefit.  "  Why  did 
you  go?"  he  asked.  "Did  you  see?"  "No,  sir." 
"  Did  you  hear  1 "  "No,  sir."  "  Why,  then,  sir,  did  you 


120  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

go  ? "  "  Because,  sir,  she  is  a  favourite  of  the  public ; 
and  when  the  public  cares  the  thousandth  part  for  you 
that  it  does  for  her,  I  -will  go  to  your  benefit  too." 

The  day  after,  Boswell  won  a  bet  from  Lady  Di 
Beauclerk  by  venturing  to  ask  Johnson  what  he  did  with 
the  orange-peel  which  he  used  to  pocket.  Johnson 
received  the  question  amicably,  but  did  not  clear  the 
mystery.  "  Then,"  said  Boswell,  "  the  world  must  be 
left  in  the  dark.  It  must  be  said,  he  scraped  them, 
and  he  let  them  dry,  but  what  he  did  with  them  next  he 
never  could  be  prevailed  upon  to  tell."  "Nay,  sir," 
replied  Johnson,  "  you  should  say  it  more  emphatically — 
he  could  not  be  prevailed  upon,  even  ^y  his  dearest 
friends  to  tell." 

This  year  Johnson  received  the  degree  of  LL.D.  from 
Oxford.  He  had  previously  (in  1765)  received  the  same 
honour  from  Dublin.  It  is  remarkable,  however,  that 
famili;ir  as  the  title  has  become,  Johnson  called  himself 
plain  Mr.  to  the  end  of  his  days,  and  was  generally  so 
called  by  his  intimates.  On  April  2nd,  at  a  dinner  at 
Hoole's,  Johns*  n  made  another  assault  upon  Gray,  and 
Mason.  When  Boswell  said  that  there  were  good  passages 
in  Mason's  Elfrida,  he  conceded  that  there  were  "  now  and 
then  some  good  imitations  of  Milton's  bad  manner."  After 
some  more  talk,  Boswell  spoke  of  the  cheerfulness  of  Fleet 
Street.  "  Why,  sir,"  said  Johnson,  "  Fleet  Street  has  a 
very  animated  appearance,  but  I  think  that  the  full  tide 
of  human  existence  is  at  Charing  Cross."  He  added  a 
story  of  an  eminent  tallow-chandler  who  had  made  a  for- 
tune in  London,  and  was  foolish  enough  to  retire  to  the 
country.  He  grew  so  tired  of  his  retreat,  that  he  begged 
to  know  the  melting-days  of  his  successor,  that  he  might 
be  present  at  the  operation. 


IV.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  121 

On  April  7th,  they  dined  at  a  tavern,  where  the  talk 
turned  upon  Ossian.  Some  one  mentioned  as  an  objec- 
tion to  its  authenticity  that  no  mention  of  Avolves  occurred 
in  it.  Johnson  fell  into  a  reverie  upon  wild  beasts,  and, 
whilst  Reynolds  and  Langton  were  discussing  something, 
he  broke  out,  "  Pennant  tells  cf  bears."  What  Pennant 
told  is  unknown.  The  company  continued  to  talk,  whilst 
Johnson  continued  his  monologue,  the  word  "bear" 
occurring  at  intervals,  like  a  word  in  a  catch.  At  last, 
when  a  pause  came,  he  was  going  on  :  "  We  are  told  that 
the  black  bear  is  innocent,  but  I  should  not  like  to  trust 
myself  with  him."  Gibbon  muttered  in  a  low  tone, 
"  I  should  not  like  to  trust  myself  with  you1' — a  prudent 
resolution,  says  honest  Eoswell  who  hated  Gibbon,  if  it 
referred  to  a  competition  of  abilities. 

The  talk  went  on  to  patriotism,  and  Johnson  laid 
down  an  apophthegm,  at  "  which  many  will  start,"  many 
people,  in  fact,  having  little  sense  of  humour.  Such  per- 
sons may  be  reminded  for  their  comfort  that  at  this  period 
patriot  had  a  technical  meaning.  "  Patriotism  is  the  last 
refuge  of  a  scoundrel."  On  the  10th  of  April,  he  laid  down 
another  dogma,  calculated  to  offend  the  weaker  brethren, 
lie  defended  Pope's  line — 

Man  never  is  but  always  to  le  blest. 

And  being  asked  if  man  did  not  sometimes  enjoy  a  mo- 
mentary happiness,  replied,  "Never,  but  when  he  is 
drunk."  It  would  be  useless  to  defend  these  and  other 
such  utterances  to  any  one  who  cannot  enjoy  them  with- 
out defence. 

On  April  llth,  the  pair  went  in  Eeynolds's  coach  to 
dine  with  Cambridge,  at  Twickenham.     Johnson  was  in 
high  spirits.     He  remarked  as  they  drove  down,  upon  the 
G* 


122  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

rarity  of  good  humour  in  life.  One  friend  mentioned  by 
Boswell  was,  he  said,  acid,  and  another  muddy.  At  last, 
stretching  himself  and  turning  with  complacency,  ho 
observed,  "  I  look  upon  myself  as  a  good-humoured  fel- 
low"— a  bit  of  self-esteem  against  which  Boswell  pro- 
tested. Johnson,  he  admitted,  was  good-natured  ;  but  was 
too  irascible  and  impatient  to  be  good-humoured.  On 
reaching  Cambridge's  house,  Johnson  ran  to  look  at  the 
books.  "  Mr.  Johnson,"  said  Cambridge  politely,  "  I 
am  going  with  your  pardon  to  accuse  myself,  for  I  have 
the  same  custom  which  I  perceive  you  have.  But  it 
seems  odd  that  one  should  have  such  a  desire  to  look  at 
the  backs  of  books."  "  Sir,"  replied  Johnson,  wheeling 
about  at  the  words,  "  the  reason  is  very  plain.  Know- 
ledge is  of  two  kinds.  "VVe  know  a  subject  ourselves,  or 
we  know  where  we  can  find  information  upon  it.  When 
we  inquire  into  any  subject,  the  first  thing  we  have  to  do 
is  to  know  what  books  have  treated  of  it.  This  leads  us 
to  look  at  catalogues,  and  the  backs  of  books  in  libraries." 

A  pleasant  talk  followed.  Johnson  denied  the  value 
attributed  to  historical  reading,  on  the  ground  that  wo 
know  very  little  except  a  few  facts  and  dates.  All  the 
'colouring,  he  said,  was  conjectural.  Boswell  chuckles 
over  the  reflection  that  Gibbon,  who  was  present,  did  not 
take  up  the  cudgels  for  his  favourite  study,  though  the  first- 
fruits  of  his  labours  were  to  appear  in  the  following  year. 
"  Probably  he  did  not  like  to  trust  himself  with  Johnson." 

The  conversation  presently  turned  upon  the  Beggar's 
Opera,  and  Johnson  sensibly  refused  to  believe  that  any 
man  had  been  made  a  rogue  by  seeing  it.  Yet  the  moralist 
felt  bound  to  utter  some  condemnation  of  such  a  perform- 
ance, and  at  last,  amidst  the  smothered  amusement  of 
tho  company,  collected  himself  to  give  a  heavy  stroke  : 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  123 

"  there  is  in  it,"  lie  said,  "  such  a  Idbefadation  of  all 
principles  as  may  "be  dangerous  to  morality." 

A  discussion  followed  as  to  whether  Sheridan  was  right 
for  refusing  to  allow  his  wife  to  continue  as  a  puhlic 
singer.  Johnson  defended  him  "  with  all  the  high  spirit 
of  a  Eoman  senator."  "  He  resolved  wisely  and  nobly,  to 
be  sure.  He  is  a  brave  man.  Would  not  a  gentleman 
be  disgraced  by  having  his  wife  sing  publicly  for  hire  1 
No,  sir,  there  can  be  no  doubt  here.  I  know  not  if  I 
should  not  prepare  myself  for  a  public  singer  as  readily  as 
let  my  wife  be  one." 

The  stout  old  supporter  of  social  authority  went  on  to 
denounce  the  politics  of  the  day.  He  asserted  that 
politics  had  come  to  mean  nothing  but  the  art  of  rising 
in  the  world.  He  contrasted  the  absence  of  any  prin- 
ciples with  the  state  of  the  national  mind  during  the  stormy 
days  of  the  seventeenth  century.  This  gives  the  pith 
of  Johnston's  political  prejudices.  He  hated  Whigs 
blindly  from  his  cradle ;  but  he  justified  his  hatred  on  the 
ground  that  they  were  now  all  "bottomless  Whigs," 
that  is  to  say,  that  pierce  where  you  would,  you  came 
upon  no  definite  creed,  but  only  upon  hollow  formulae, 
intended  as  a  cloak  for  private  interest.  If  Burke  and  one 
or  two  of  his  friends  be  excepted,  the  remark  had  but  too 
much  justice. 

In  1776,  Bos  well  found  Johnson  rejoicing  in  the  pro- 
spect of  a  journey  to  Italy  with  the  Thrales.  Before 
starting  he  was  to  take  a  trip  to  the  country,  in  which 
Bos  well  agreed  to  join.  Bos  well  gathered  up  various 
bits  of  advice  before  their  departure.  One  seems  to  have, 
commended  itself  to  him  as  specially  available  for  prac- 
tice. "  A  man  who  had  been  drinking  freely,"  said  the 
moralist,  "  should  never  go  into  a  new  company.  Ho 


124  SAM  DEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

would  probably  strike  them  as  ridiculous,  though  he 
might  be  in  unison  with  those  who  had  been  drinking 
with  him."  Johnson  propounded  another  favourite  theory. 
"A  ship,"  he  said,  "was  worse  than  a  gaol.  There  is  in 
a  gaol  better  air,  better  company,  better  conveniency  of 
every  kind ;  and  a  ship  has  the  additional  disadvantage 
of  being  in  danger." 

On  March  19th,  they  went  by  coach  to  the  Angel  at 
Oxford ;  and  next  morning  visited  the  Master  of  Uni- 
versity College,  who  chose  with  Boswell  to  act  in  oppo- 
sition to  a  very  sound  bit  of  advice  given  by  Johnson 
soon  afterwards — perhaps  with  some  reference  to  the  pro- 
ceeding. "  Never  speak  of  a  man  in  his  own  presence  ;  it 
is  always  indelicate  and  may  be  offensive."  The  two,  how- 
ever, discussed  Johnson  without  reserve.  The  Master  said 
that  he  would  have  given  Johnson  a  hundred  pounds  for  a 
discourse  on  the  British  Constitution ;  and  Boswell  sug- 
gested that  Johnson  should  write  two  volumes  of  no 
great  bulk  upon  Church  and  State,  which  should  comprise 
the  whole  substance  of  the  argument.  "  He  should  erect 
a  fort  on  the  confines  of  each."  Johnson  was  not  unna- 
turally displeased  with  the  dialogue,  and  growled  out, 
"  Why  should  I  be  always  writing  ? " 

Presently,  they  went  to  see  Dr.  Adams,  the  doctor's 
old  friend,  who  had  been  answering  Hume.  Boswell,  who 
had  done  his  best  to  court  the  acquaintance  of  Voltaire, 
Eousseau,  Wilkes,  and  Hume  himself,  felt  it  desirable  to 
reprove  Adams  for  having  met  Hume  with  civility.  He 
aired  his  admirable  sentiments  in  a  long  speech,  observing 
upon  the  connexion  between  theory  and  practice,  and  re- 
marking, by  way  of  practical  application,  that,  if  an  infidel 
were  at  once  vain  and  ugly,  he  might  be  compared  to 
"  Cicero's  beautiful  image  of  Virtue" — which  would,  as  he 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  1-5 

seems  to  think,  be  a  crushing  retort.  Boswell  always 
delighted  in  fighting  with  his  gigantic  backer  close  behind 
him.  Johnson,  as  he  had  doubtless  expected,  chimed  in 
with  the  argument.  "  You  should  do  your  best,"  said 
Johnson,  "  to  diminish  the  authority,  as  well  as  dispute  the 
arguments  of  your  adversary,  because  most  people  are 
biased  more  by  personal  respect  than  by  reasoning."  "  You 
would  not  jostle  a  chimney-sweeper,"  said  Adams.  "Yes," 
replied  Johnson,  "if  it  were  necessary  to  jostle  him 
down." 

The  pair  proceeded  by  post-chaise  past  Blenheim,  and 
dined  at  a  good  inn  at  Chapelhouse.  Johnston  boasted 
of  the  superiority,  long  since  vanished  if  it  ever  existed, 
of  English  to  French  inns,  and  quoted  with  great  emo- 
tion Shenstone's  lines — 

Whoe'er  has  travell'd  life's  dull  round, 

Where'er  his  stages  may  have  been, 
Must  sigh  to  think  he  still  has  found 

The  warmest  welcome  at  an  inn. 

As  they  drove  along  rapidly  in  the  post-chaise,  he  ex- 
claimed, "Life  has  not  many  better  things  than  this." 
On  another  occasion  he  said  that  he  should  like  to  spend 
his  life  driving  briskly  in  a  post-chaise  with  a  pretty 
woman,  clever  enough  to  add  to  the  conversation.  The 
pleasure  was  partly  owing  to  the  fact  that  his  deafness  was 
less  troublesome  in  a  carriage.  But  he  admitted  that 
there  were  drawbacks  even  to  this  pleasure.  Boswell 
asked  him  whether  he  would  not  add  a  post-chaise  journey 
to  the  other  sole  cause  of  happiness — namely,  drunken- 
ness. "  No,  sir,"  said  Johnson,  "  you  are  driving  rapidly 
from  something  or  to  something." 

They  went    to  Birmingham,  where   Boswell    pumped 


126  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Hector  about  Johnson's  early  days,  and  saw  the  works  of 
Boulton,  Watt's  partner,  who  said  to  him,  "  I  sell  here, 
sir,  what  all  the  world  desires  to  have — power"  Thenco 
they  went  to  Lichfield,  and  met  more  of  the  rapidly 
thinning  circle  of  Johnson's  oldest  friends.  Here  Boswell 
was  a  little  scandalized  by  Johnson's  warm  exclamation 
on  opening  a  letter — "  One  of  the  most  dreadful  things 
that  has  happened  in  my  time  ! "  This  turned  out  to  be  the 
death  of  Thrale's  only  son.  Boswell  thought  the  phrase 
too  big  for  the  event,  and  was  some  time  before  he  could 
feel  a  proper  concern.  He  was,  however,  "curious  to 
observe  how  Dr.  Johnson  would  be  affected,"  and  was  again 
a  little  scandalized  by  the  reply  to  his  consolatory  remark 
that  the  Thrales  still  had  daughters.  "  Sir,"  said  Johnson, 
"don't  you  know  how  you  yourself  think?  Sir,  he 
wishes  to  propagate  his  name."  The  great  man  was 
actually  putting  the  family  sentiment  of  a  brewer  in  the 
same  category  with  the  sentiments  of  the  heir  of  Auchin- 
leck.  Johnson,  however,  calmed  down,  but  resolved  to 
hurry  back  to  London.  They  stayed  a  night  at  Taylor's, 
who  remarked  that  he  had  fought  a  good  many  battles 
for  a  physician,  one  of  their  common  friends.  "  But  you 
should  consider,  sir,"  said  Johnson,  "  that  by  every  one 
of  your  victories  he  is  a  loser ;  for  every  man  of  whom 
you  get  the  better  will  be  very  angry,  and  resolve  not  to 
employ  him,  whereas  if  people  get  the  better  of  you  in 
argument  about  him,  they  will  think  'We'll  send  for 

Dr. nevertheless  !' " 

It  was  after  their  return  to  London  that  Boswell  won 
the  greatest  triumph  of  his  friendship.  He  carried  through 
a  negotiation,  to  which,  as  Burke  pleasantly  said,  there 
was  nothing  equal  in  the  whole  history  of  the  corps  diplo- 
matique. At  some  moment  of  enthusiasm  it  had  occurred 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  127 

to  him  to  bring  Johnson  into  company  -with  Wilkes. 
The  infidel  demagogue  was  probably  in  the  mind  of  the 
Tory  High  Churchman,  when  he  threw  out  that  pleasant 
little  apophthegm  about  patriotism.  To  bring  together 
two  such  opposites  without  provoking  a  collision  would 
be  the  croAvning  triumph  of  Boswell's  curiosity.  He  was 
ready  to  run  all  hazards  as  a  chemist  might  try  some 
new  experiment  at  the  risk  of  a  destructive  explosion ; 
but  being  resolved,  he  took  every  precaution  with  ad- 
mirable foresight. 

Boswell  had  been  invited  by  the  Dillys,  well-known 
booksellers  of  the  day,  to  meet  Wilkes.  "  Let  us  have 
Johnson,"  suggested  the  gallant  Boswell.  "  Not  for  the 
world !"  exclaimed  Dilly.  But,  on  Boswell's  undertaking 
the  negotiation,  he  consented  to  the  experiment.  Boswell 
went  off  to  Johnson  and  politely  invited  him  in  Billy's 
name.  "  I  will  wait  upon  him,"  said  Johnson.  "  Pro- 
vided, sir,  I  suppose,"  said  the  diplomatic  Boswell,  "  that 
the  company  which  he  is  to  have  is  agreeable  to  you." 
"What  do  you  mean,  sir?"  exclaimed  Johnson.  "What 
do  you  take  me  for  1  Do  you  think  I  am  so  ignorant  of 
the  world  as  to  prescribe  to  a  gentleman  what  company 
he  is  to  have  at  his  table1?"  Boswell  worked  the  point  a 
little  farther,  till,  by  judicious  manipulation,  he  had  got 
Johnsqn  to  commit  himself  to  meeting  anybody — even 
Jack  Wilkes,  to  make  a  wild  hypothesis — at  the  Dillys' 
table.  Boswell  retired,  hoping  to  think  that  he  had  fixed 
the  discussion  in  Johnson's  mind. 

The  great  day  arrived,  and  Boswell,  like  a  consummate 
general  who  leaves  nothing  to  chance,  went  himself  to 
fetch  Johnson  to  the  dinner.  The  great  man  had  for- 
gotten the  engagement,  and  was  "  buffeting  his  books  "  in 
a  dirty  shirt  and  amidst  clouds  of  dust.  When  reminded 


128  SAMUEL-  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

of  his  promise,  he  said  that  he  had  ordered  dinner  at 
home  with  Mrs.  Williams.  Entreaties  of  the  warmest 
kind  from  Boswell  softened  the  peevish  old  lady,  to 
whose  pleasure  Johnson  had  referred  him.  Boswell  flew 
back,  announced  Mrs.  Williams's  consent,  and  Johnson 
roared,  "  Frank,  a  clean  shirt !"  and  was  soon  in  a  hackney- 
coach.  Boswell  rejoiced  like  a  "  fortune-hunter  who  has 
got  an  heiress  into  a  post-chaise  with  him  to  set  out  for 
Gretna  Green."  Yet  the  joy  was  with  trembling.  Arrived 
at  Dillys',  Johnson  found  himself  amongst  strangers,  and 
Boswell  watched  anxiously  from  a  corner.  "  Who  is  that 
gentleman  ?"  whispered  Johnson  to  Dilly.  "  Mr.  Arthur 
Lee."  Johnson  whistled  "  too-too-too "  doubtfully,  for 
Lee  was  a  patriot  and  an  American.  "  And  who  is  the 
gentleman  in  lace?"  "Mr.  Wilkes,  sir."  Johnson  sub- 
sided into  a  window-seat  and  fixed  his  eye  on  a  book. 
He  was  fairly  in  the  toils.  His  reproof  of  Boswell  was 
recent  enough  to  prevent  him  from  exhibiting  his  dis- 
pleasure, and  he  resolved  to  restrain  himself. 

At  dinner  Wilkes,  placed  next  to  Johnson,  took  up  his 
part  in  the  performance.  He  pacified  the  sturdy  moralist 
by  delicate  attentions  to  his  needs.  He  helped  him  care- 
fully to  some  fine  veal.  "  Pray  give  me  leave,  sir ;  it  is 
better  here — a  little  of  the  brown — some  fat,  sir — a  little 
of  the  stuffing — some  gravy — let  me  have  the  pleasure  of 
giving  you  some  butter.  Allow  me  to  recommend  a 
squeeze  of  this  orange ;  or  the  lemon,  perhaps,  may  have 
more  zest."  "  Sir,  sir,"  cried  Johnson,  "  I  am  obliged  to 
you,  sir,"  bowing  and  turning  to  him,  with  a  look  for 
some  time  of  "  surly  virtue,"  and  soon  of  complacency. 

Gradually  the  conversation  became  cordial.  Johnson 
told  of  the  fascination  exercised  by  Foote,  who,  like 
Wilkes,  had  succeeded  in  pleasing  him  against  his  will. 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  129 

Foote  once  took  to  selling  beer,  and  it  was  so  bad  that 
the  servants  of  Fitzherbert,  one  of  his  customers,  resolved 
to  protest.  They  chose  a  little  black  boy  to  carry  their 
remonstrance ;  but  the  boy  waited  at  table  one  day  when 
Foote  was  present,  and  returning  to  his  companions,  said, 
"  This  is  the  finest  man  I  have  ever  seen.  I  will  not 
deliver  your  message ;  I  will  drink  his  beer."  From 
Foote  the  transition  was  easy  to  Garrick,  whom  Johnson, 
as  usual,  defended  against  the  attacks  of  others.  He  main- 
tained that  Garrick's  reputation  for  avarice,  though  un- 
founded, had  been  rather  useful  than  otherwise.  "  You 
despise  a  man  for  avarice,  but' you  do  not  hate  him."  The 
clamour  would  have  been  more  effectual,  had  it  been 
directed  against  his  living  with  splendour  too  great  for 
a  player.  Johnson  went  on  to  speak  of  the  difficulty  of 
getting  biographical  information.  When  he  had  wished 
to  write  a  life  of  Dryden,  he  applied  to  two  living  men 
who  remembered  him.  One  could  only  tell  him  that 
Dryden  had  a  chair  by  the  fire  at  Will's  Coffee-house  in 
winter,  which  was  moved  to  the  balcony  in  summer.  The 
other  (Gibber)  could  only  report  that  he  remembered 
Dryden  as  a  "decent  old  man,  arbiter  of  critical  disputes 
at  Will's." 

Johnson  and  Wilkes  had  one  point  in  common — a 
vigorous,  prejudice  against  the  Scotch,  and  upon  this  topic 
they  cracked  their  jokes  in  friendly  emulation.  When 
they  met  upon  a  later  occasion  (1781),  they  still  pursued 
this  inexhaustible  subject.  Wilkes  told  how  a  privateer 
had  completely  plundered  seven  Scotch  islands,  and  ro- 
embarked  with  three  and  sixpence.  Johnson  now  re- 
marked in  answer  to  somebody  who  said  "  Poor  old  Eng- 
land is  lost ! "  "  Sir,  it  is  not  so  much  to  be  lamented  that 
old  England  is  lost,  as  that  the  Scotch  have  found  it." 


130  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

"  You  must  know,  sir,"  he  said  to  Wilkes,  "  that  I  lately 
took  my  friend  Boswell  and  showed  him  genuine  civilized 
life  in  an  English  provincial  town.  I  turned  him  loose  at 
Lichfield,  that  he  might  see  for  once  real  civility,  for  you 
know  he  lives  among  savages  in  Scotland  and  among 
rakes  in  London."  "  Except,"  said  Wilkes,  "  when  he  is 
with  grave,  sober,  decent  people  like  you  and  me."  "  And 
we  ashamed  of  him,"  added  Johnson,  smiling. 

Boswell  had  to  bear  some  jokes  against  himself  and  his 
countrymen  from  the  pair ;  but  he  had  triumphed,  and 
rejoiced  greatly  when  he  went  home  with  Johnson,  and 
heard  the  great  man  speak  of  his  pleasant  dinner  to  Mrs. 
Williams.  Johnson  seems  to  haA^e  been  permanently 
reconciled  to  his  foe.  "  Did  we  not  hear  so  much  said 
of  Jack  Wilkes,"  he  remarked  next  year,  "  we  should 
think  more  highly  of  his  conversation.  Jack  has  a  great 
variety  of  talk,  Jack  is  a  scholar,  and  Jack  has  the  man- 
ners of  a  gentleman.  But,  after  hearing  his  name  sounded 
from  pole  to  pole  as  the  phoenix  of  convivial  felicity,  wo 
are  disappointed  in  his  company.  He  has  always  been  at 
me,  but  I  would  do  Jack  a  kindness  rather  than  not. 
The  contest  is  now  over." 

In  fact,  Wilkes  had  ceased  to  play  any  part  in  public 
life.  When  Johnson  met  him  next  (in  1781)  they  joked 
about  such  dangerous  topics  as  some  of  Wilkes's  political 
performances.  Johnson  sent  him  a  copy  of  the  Lives, 
and  they  were  seen  conversing  tete-a-tete  in  confidential 
whispers  about  George  II.  and  the  King  of  Prussia.  To 
Boswell's  mind  it  suggested  the  happy  days  when  the  lion 
should  lie  down  with  the  kid,  or,  as  Dr.  Barnard  sug- 
gested, the  goat. 

In  the  year  1777  Johnson  began  the  Lives  of  the  Pock, 
in  compliance  with  a  request  from  the  booksellers,  who 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  131 

wished  for  prefaces  to  a  large  collection  of  English  poetry. 
Johnson  asked  for  this  work  the  extremely  modest  sum 
of  200  guineas,  when  he  might  easily,  according  to 
Malono,  have  received  1000  or  1500.  Ho  did  not 
meet  Boswell  till  September,  when  they  spent  ten 
days  together  at  Dr.  Taylor's.  The  subject  which  spe- 
cially interested  Boswell  at  this  time  was  the  fate  of  the 
unlucky  Dr.  Dodd,  hanged  for  forgery  in  the  previous 
June.  Dodd  seems  to  have  been  a  worthless  charlatan  of 
the  popular  preacher  variety.  His  crime  would  not  in 
our  days  have  been  thought  worthy  of  so  severe  a  punish- 
ment; but  his  contemporaries  were  less  shocked  by  the 
fact  of  death  being  inflicted  for  such  a  fault,  than  by  the 
fact  of  its  being  inflicted  on  a  clergyman.  Johnson  exerted 
himself  to  procure  a  remission  of  the  sentence  by  writing 
various  letters  and  petitions  on  Dodd's  behalf.  He  seems 
to  have  been  deeply  moved  by  the  man's  appeal,  and 
could  "  not  bear  the  thought "  that  any  negligence  of  his 
should  lead  to  the  death  of  a  fellow-creature  ;  but  he  said 
that  if  he  had  himself  been  in  authority  he  would  have 
signed  the  death-warrant,  and  for  the  man  himself,  ho 
had  as  little  respect  as  might  be.  He  said,  indeed,  that 
Dodd  was  right  in  not  joining  in  the  "cant"  about 
leaving  a  wretched  world.  "No,  no,"  said  the  poor 
rogue,  "  it  has  been  a  very  agreeable  world  to  me."  Dodd 
had  allowed  to  pass  for  his  own  one  of  the  papers  com- 
posed for  him  by  Johnson,  and  the  Doctor  was  not  quite 
pleased.  When,  however,  Seward  expressed  a  doubt  as 
to  Dodd's  power  of  writing  so  forcibly,  Johnson  felt 
bound  not  to  expose  him.  "  Why  should  you  think  so? 
Depend  upon  it,  sir,  when  any  man  knows  he  is  to  be 
hanged  in  a  fortnight,  it  concentrates,  his  mind  wonder- 
fully." On  another  occasion,  Johnson  expressed  a  doubt 


132  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

himself  as  to  whether  Dodd  had  really  composed  a  certain 
prayer  on  the  night  before  his  execution.  "  Sir,  do  you 
think  that  a  man  the  night  before  he  is  to  be  hanged  cares 
for  the  succession  of  the  royal  family  1  Though  he  may 
have  composed  this  prayer  then.  A  man  who  lias  been 
canting  all  his  life  may  cant  to  the  last ;  and  yet  a  man 
who  has  been  refused  a  pardon  after  so  much  petitioning, 
would  hardly  be  praying  thus  fervently  for  the  king." 

The  last  day  at  Taylor's  was  characteristic.  Johnson 
was  very  cordial  to  his  disciple,  and  Boswell  fancied  that 
he  could  defend  his  master  at  "  the  point  of  his  sword." 
"  My  regard  for  you,"  said  Johnson,  "  is  greater  almost 
than  I  have  words  to  express,  but  I  do  not  choose  to  be 
always  repeating  it.  "Write  it  down  in  the  first  leaf  of 
your  pocket-book,  and  never  doubt  of  it  again."  They 
became  sentimental,  and  talked  of  the  misery  of  human 
life.  Boswell  spoke  of  the  pleasures  of  society.  "  Alas, 
sir,"  replied  Johnson,  like  a  true  pessimist,  "  these  are 
only  struggles  for  happiness  !"  He  felt  exhilarated,  he 
said,  when  he  first  went  to  Eanelagh,  but  he  changed  to 
the  mood  of  Xerxes  weeping  at  the  sight  of  his  army. 
"  It  went  to  my  heart  to  consider  that  there  was  not  one 
in  all  that  brilliant  circle  that  was  not  afraid  to  go  home 
and  think  ;  but  that  the  thoughts  of  each  individual  would 
be  distressing  when  alone."  Some  years  before  he  had 
gone  with  Boswell  to  the  Pantheon  and  taken  a  more 
cheerful  view.  "When  Boswell  doubted  whether  there 
were  many  happy  people  present,  he  said,  "  Yes,  sir,  there 
are  many  happy  people  here.  There  are  many  people 
here  who  are  watching  hundreds,  and  who  think  hundreds 
are  watching  them."  The  more  permanent  feeling  was 
that  which  he  expressed  in  the  "serene  autumn  night" 
in  Taylor's  garden.  He  was  willing,  however,  to  talk 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  133 

calmly  about  eternal  punishment,  and  to  admit  the  possi- 
bility of  a  "  mitigated  interpretation." 

After  supper  he  dictated  to  Boswell  an  argument  in 
favour  of  the  negro  who  was  then  claiming  his  liberty  in 
Scotland.  He  hated  slavery  with  a  zeal  which  the  excel- 
lent Bos  well  thought  to  be  "  without  knoAvledgc  ;"  and  on 
one  occasion  gave  as  a  toast  to  some  "  very  grave  men  v 
at  Oxford,  "  Here's  to  the  next  insurrection  of  negroes  in 
the  West  Indies."  The  hatred  was  combined  with  as 
hearty  a  dislike  for  American  independence.  "  How  is 
it,"  ho  said,  "  that  we  always  hear  the  loudest  yelps  for 
liberty  amongst  the  drivers  of  negroes  ? "  The  harmony 
of  the  evening  was  unluckily  spoilt  by  an  explosion  of 
this  prejudice.  Boswell  undertook  the  defence  of  the 
colonists,  arid  the  discussion  became  so  fierce  that  though 
Johnson  had  expressed  a  willingness  to  sit  up  all  night 
with  him,  they  were  glad  to  part  after  an  hour  or  two,  and 
go  to  bed. 

In  1778,  Boswell  came  to  London  and  found  Johnson 
absorbed,  to  an  extent  which  apparently  excited  .his  jea- 
lousy, by  his  intimacy  Avith  the  ThraleSi  They  had,  how- 
ever, several  agreeable  meetings.  One  was  at  the  club, 
and  BoswelTs  report  of  the  conversation  is  the  fullest 
that  wo  have  of  any  of  its  meetings.  A  certain  reserve 
is  indicated  by  his  using  initials  for  the  interlocutors,  of 
whom,  however,  one  can  be  easily  identified  as  Burke. 
The  talk  began  by  a  discussion  of  an  antique  statue,  said 
to  be  the  dog  of  Alcibiades,  and  valued  at  1000Z.  Burke 
said  that  the  representation  of  no  animal  could  be  worth 
so  much.  Johnson,  whose  taste  for  art  was  a  vanishing 
quantity,  said  that  the  value  was  proportional  to  the  dif- 
ficulty. A  statue,  as  he  argued  on  another  occasion,  would 
be  worth  nothing  if  it  were  cut  out  of  a  carrot.  Every- 


134  SAMUEL  JOIINSON.  [CUAP. 

thing,  he  now  said,  was  valuable  which  "  enlarged  the 
sphere  of  human  powers."  The  first  man  who  balanced 
a  straw  upon  his  nose,  or  rode  upon  three  horses  at  once, 
deserved  the  applause  of  mankind ;  and  so  statues  of  ani- 
mals should  be  preserved  as  a  proof  of  dexterity,  though 
men  should  not  continue  such  fruitless  labours. 

The  conversation  became  more  instructive  under  the 
guidance  of  Burke.  He  maintained  what  seemed  to  his 
hearers  a  paradox,  though  it  would  be  interesting  to  hear 
his  arguments  from  some  profounder  economist  than  Bos- 
well,  that  a  country  would  be  made  more  populous  by 
emigration.  "  There  are  bulls  enough  in  Ireland,"  he 
remarked  incidentally  in  the  course  of  the  argument. 
"  So,  sir,  I  should  think  from  your  argument,"  said  John- 
son, for  once  condescending  to  an  irresistible  pun.  It  is 
recorded,  too,  that  he  once  made  a  bull  himself,  observing 
that  a  horse  was  so  slow  that  when  it  went  up  hill,  it 
stood  still.  11'  he  now  failed  to  appreciate  Burke's  argu- 
ment, l:e  made  one  good  remark.  Another  speaker  said 
that  unhealthy  countries  were  the  most  populous.  "  Coun- 
tries which  are  the  most  populous,"  replied  Johnson, 
"have  the  most  destructive  diseases.  That  is  the  true 
state  of  the  proposition  ;"  and  indeed,  the  remark  applies 
to  the  case  of  emigration. 

A  discussion  then  took  place  as  to  whether  it  would  be 
worth  while  for  Burke  to  take  so  much  trouble  with 
speeches  which  never  decided  a  vote.  Burke  replied  that 
a  speech,  though  it  did  not  gain  one  vote,  would  have  an 
influence,  and  maintained  that  the  House  of  Commons 
was  not  wholly  corrupt.  "  We  are  all  more  or  less 
governed  by  interest,"  was  Johnson's  comment.  "But 
interest  will  not  do  everything.  In  a  case  which  admits 
of^doubt,  we  try  to  think  on  the  side  which  is  for  our  into- 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  135 

rest,  and  generally  bring  ourselves  to  act  accordingly. 
But  the  subject  must  admit  of  diversity  of  colouring ;  it 
must  receive  a  colour  on  that  side.  In  the  House  of  Com- 
mons there  are  members  enough  who  will  not  vote  what 
is  grossly  absurd  and  unjust.  No,  sir,  there  must  always 
be  right  enough,  or  appearance  of  right,  to  keep  wrong  in 
countenance."  After  some  deviations,  the  conversation 
returned  to  this  point.  Johnson  and  Burke  agreed  on  a 
characteristic  statement.  Burke  said  that  from  his  expe- 
rience he  had  learnt  to  think  better  of  mankind.  "  From 
my  experience,"  replied  Johnson,  "I  have  found  them 
worse  on  commercial  dealings,  more  disposed  to  cheat  than 
I  had  any  notion  of;  but  more  disposed  to  do  one  another 
good  than  I  had  conceived."  "  Less  just,  and  more  benefi- 
cent," as  another  speaker  suggested.  Johnson  proceeded 
to  say  that  considering  the  pressure  of  want,  it  Avas  won- 
derful that  men  would  do  so  much  for  each  other.  The 
greatest  liar  is  said  to  speak  more  truth  than  falsehood, 
and  perhaps  the  worst  man  might  do  more  good  than  not. 
But  when  Boswell  suggested  that  perhaps  experience 
might  increase  our  estimate  of  human  happiness,  Johnson 
returned  to  his  habitual  pessimism.  "  No,  sir,  the  more 
we  inquire,  the  more  we  shall  find  men  less  happy."  The 
talk  soon  wandered  off  into  a  disquisition  upon  the  folly 
of  deliberately  testing  the  strength  of  our  "friend's  affection. 

The  evening  ended  by  Johnson  accepting  a  commission 
to  write  to  a  friend  who  had  given  to  the  Club  a  hogshead 
of  claret,  and  to  request  another,  with  "  a  happy  am- 
biguity of  expression,"  in  the  hopes  that  it  might  also 
be  a  present. 

Some  days  afterwards,  another  conversation  took  place, 
which  has  a  certain  celebrity  in  Boswellian  literature. 
The  scene  was  at  DUly's,  and  the  guests  included  Miss 


136  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [en  A  p. 

Seward  and  Mrs.  Knowles,  a  well-known  Quaker  Lady. 
Before  dinner  Johnson  seized  upon,  a  book  which  ha  kept 
in  his  lap  during  dinner,  wrapped  up  in  the  table-cloth. 
His  attention  was  not  distracted  from  the  various  business 
of  the  hour,  but  he  hit  upon  a  topic  which,  happily  com- 
bined the  two  appropriate  veins  of  thought.  He  boasted 
that  he  would  write  a  cookery-book  upon  philosophical 
principles ;  and  declared  in  opposition  to  Miss  Seward 
that  such  a  task  was  beyond  the  sphere  of  woman.  Per- 
haps this  led  to  a  discussion  upon  the  privileges  of  men,  in 
which  Johnson  put  down  Mrs.  Knowles,  who  had  some 
hankering  for  women's  rights,  by  the  Shakspearian 
maxim  that  if  two  men  ride  on  a  horse,  one  must  ride 
behind.  Driven  from  her  position  in  this  world,  poor 
Mrs.  Kuowlcs  hoped  that  sexes  might  be  equal  in  the 
next.  Boswell  reproved  her  by  the  remark  already  quoted, 
that  men  might  as  well  expect  to  be  equal  to  angels.  He 
enforces  this  view  by  an  illustration  suggested  by  the 
"  Eev.  Mr.  Brown  of  Utrecht,"  who  had  observed  that  a 
great  or  small  glass  might  be  equally  full,  though  not 
holding  equal  quantities.  Mr.  Brown  intended  this  for  a 
confutation  of  Hume,  who  has  said  that  a  little  Miss, 
dressed  for  a  ball,  may  be  as  happy  as  an  orator  who  has 
won  some  triumphant  success.1 

The  conversation  thus  took .  a  theological  turn,  and 
Mrs.  Knowles  was  fortunate  enough  to  win  Johnson's 
high  approval.  He  defended  a  doctrine  maintained  by 
Soame  Jenyns,  that  friendship  is  not  a  Christian  virtue. 
Mrs.  Knowles  remarked  that  Jesus  had  twelve  disciples, 

1  Boswell  remarks  as  a  curious  coincidence  that  the  same  illus- 
tration had  been  used  by  a  Dr.  King,  a  dissenting  minister. 
Doubtless  it  has  been  used  often  enough.  For  one  instance  see 
Donne'*  Sermons  (Alford's  Edition),  vol.  i.,  p.  5. 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  137 

but  there  was  one  whom  he  loved.  Johnson,  "  with  eyes 
sparkling  benignantly,"  exclaimed,  "Very  well  indeed, 
madam ;  you  have  said  very  well ! " 

So  far  all  had  gone  smoothly  ;  but  here,  for  some  inex- 
plicable reason,  Johnson,  burst  into  a  sudden  fury  against 
the  American  rebels,  whom  he  described  as  "  rascals, 
robbers,  pirates,"  and  roared  out  a  tremendous  volley, 
which  might  almost  have  been  audible  across  the  Atlantic. 
Boswell  sat  and  trembled,  but  gradually  diverted  the  sage 
to  less  exciting  topics.  The  name  of  Jonathan  Edwards 
suggested  a  discussion  upon  free  will  and  necessity,  upon 
which  poor  Boswell  was  much  given  to  worry  himself. 
Some  time  afterwards  Johnson  wrote  to  him,  in  answer 
to  one  of  his  lamentations  :  "  I  hoped  you  had  got  rid  of 
all  this  hypocrisy  of  misery.  What  have  you  to  do  with 
liberty  and  necessity  1  Or  what  more  than  to  hold  your 
tongue  about  it  1 "  Boswell  could  never  take  this  sensible 
advice  ;  but  he  got  little  comfort  from  his  oracle.  "  We 
know  that  we  are  all  free,  and  there's  an  end  on't,"  was 
his  statement  on  one  occasion,  and  now  he  could  only 
say,  "  All  theory  is  against  the  freedom  of  the  will,  and  all 
experience  for  it." 

Some  familiar  topics  followed,  which  play  a  great  part 
in  Boswell's  reports.  Among  the  favourite  topics  -of 
the  sentimentalists  of  the  day  was  the  denunciation  of 
"luxury,"  and  of  civilized  life  in  general.  There  was 
a  disposition  to  find  in  the  South  Sea  savages  or 
American  Indians  an  embodiment  of  the  fancied  state 
of  nature.  Johnson  heartily  despised  the  affectation. 
He  was  told  of  an  American  woman  who  had  to  be  bound 
in  order  to  keep  her  from  savage  life.  "  She  must  have 
been  an  animal,  a  beast,"  said  Boswell.  "  Sir,"  said 
Johnson,  "  she  was  a  speaking  cat*"  Somebody  quoted 
7 


138  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

to  him  -with  admiration  the  soliloquy  of  an  officer  who 
had  lived  in  the  wilds  of  America  :  "  Here  am  I,  free  and 
unrestrained,  amidst  the  rude  magnificence  of  nature,  with 
the  Indian  woman  by  my  side,  and  this  gun,  with  which 
I  can  procure  food  when  I  want  it !  "What  more  can 
be  desired  for  human  happiness1?"  "Do  not  allow  your- 
self, sir,"  replied  Johnson,  "  to  be  imposed  upon  by  such 
gross  absurdity.  It  is  sad  stuff;  it  is  brutish.  If  a  bull 
could  speak,  he  might  as  well  exclaim,  '  Here  am  I  with 
this  cow  and  this  grass ;  what  being  can  enjoy  greater 
felicity  ?' "  When  Johnson  implored  Boswell  to  "  clear 
his  mind  of  cant,"  he  was  attacking  his  disciple  for  affect- 
ing a  serious  depression  about  public  affairs ;  but  the  cant 
which  he  hated  would  certainly  have  included  as  its  first 
article  an  admiration  for  the  state  of  nature. 

On  the  present  occasion  Johnson  defended  luxury,  and 
said  that  he  had  learnt  much  from  Mandeville — a  shrewd 
cynic,  in  whom  Johnson's  hatred  for  humbug  is  exag- 
gerated into  a  general  disbelief  in  real  as  well  as  sham 
nobleness  of  sentiment.  As  the  conversation  proceeded, 
Johnson  expressed  his  habitual  horror  of  death,  and 
caused  Hiss  Seward's  ridicule  by  talking  seriously  of 
ghosts  and  the  importance  of  the  question  of  their  reality ; 
and  then  followed  an  explosion,  which  seems  to  have 
closed  this  characteristic  evening.  A  young  woman  had 
become  a  Quaker  under  the  influence  of  Mrs.  Knowles, 
who  now  proceeded  to  deprecate  Johnson's  wrath  at  what 
he  regarded  as  an  apostasy.  "  Madam,"  he  said,  "  she  is 
an  odious  wench,"  and  he  proceeded  to  denounce  her 
audacity  in  presuming  to  choose  a  religion  for  herself. 
"  She  knew  no  more  of  the  points  of  difference,"  he  said, 
"  than  of  the  difference  between  the  Copernican  and 
Ptolemaic  systems."  "When  Mrs.  Knowles  said  that  she 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITERARY  DICTATOR.  139 

had  the  New  Testament  before  her,  he  said  that  it  was 
the  "  most  difficult  book  in  the  world,"  and  he  proceeded 
to  attack  the  unlucky  proselyte  with  a  fury  which  shocked 
the  two  ladies.  Mrs.  Knowles  afterwards  published  a 
report  of  this  conversation,  and  obtained  another  report, 
with  which,  however,  she  was  not  satisfied,  from  Miss 
Seward.  Both  of  them  represent  the  poor  doctor  as 
hopelessly  confuted  by  the  mild  dignity  and  calm  reason 
of  Mrs.  Knowles,  though  the  triumph  is  painted  in  far 
the  brightest  colours  by  Mrs.  Knowles  herself.  Un- 
luckily, there  is  not  a  trace  of  Johnson's  manner,  except 
in  one  phrase,  in  either  report,  and  they  are  chiefly  curious 
as  an  indirect  testimony  to  Boswell's  superior  powers. 
The  passage,  in  which  both  the  ladies  agree,  is  that  John- 
son, on  the  expression  of  Mrs.  Knowles's  hope  that  he 
would  meet  the  young  lady  in  another  world,  retorted 
that  he  was  not  fond  of  meeting  fools  anywhere. 

Poor  Boswell  was  at  this  time  a  water-drinke^  by 
Johnson's  recommendation,  though  unluckily  for  him- 
self he  never  broke  off  his  drinking  habits  for  long. 
They  had  a  conversation  at  Paoli's,  in  which  Boswell 
argued  against  his  present  practice.  Johnson  remarked 
"  that  wine  gave  a  man  nothing,  but  only  put  in  motion 
what  had  been  locked  up  in  frost."  It  was  a  key, 
suggested  some  one,  which  opened  a  box,  but  the  box 
might  be  full  or  empty.  "  ]S"ay,  sir,"  said  Johnson, 
"  conversation  is  the  key,  wine  is  a  picklock,  which 
forces  open  the  box  and  injures  it.  A  man  should 
cultivate  his  mind,  so  as  to  have  that  confidence  and 
readiness  without  wine  which  wine  gives."  Boswell 
characteristically  said  that  the  great  difficulty  was  from 
"  benevolence."  It  was  hard  to  refuse  "  a  good,  worthy 
man "  who  asked  you  to  try  his  cellar.  This,  according 


140  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

to  Johnson,  was  mere  conceit,  implying  an  exaggerated 
estimate  of  your  importance  to  your  entertainer.  Reynolds 
gallantly  took  up  the  opposite  side,  and  produced  the 
one  recorded  instance  of  a  Johnsonian  Hush.  "  I  won't 
argue  any  more  with  you,  sir,"  said  Johnson,  who  thought 
every  man  to  bo  elevated  who  drank  wine,  "  you  are  too 
far  gone."  "  I  should  have  thought  so  indeed,  sir,  had  I 
made  such  a  speech  as  you  have  now  done,"  said  Reynolds ; 
and  Johnson  apologized  with  the  aforesaid  blush. 

The  explosion  was  soon  over  on  this  occasion.  !Not 
long  afterwards,  Johnson  attacked  Boswell  so  fiercely 
at  a  dinner  at  Reynolds's,  that  the  poor  disciple  kept 
away  for  a  week.  They  made  it  up  when  they  met 
next,  and  Johnson  solaced  Boswell's  wounded  vanity  by 
highly  commending  an  image  made  by  him  to  express 
his  feelings.  "I  don't  care  how  often  or  how  high 
Johnson  tosses  me,  when  only  friends  are  present,  for  then 
I  fall  upon  soft  ground;  but  I  do  not  like  falling  on 
stones,  which  is  the  case  when  enemies  are  present." 
The  phrase  may  recall  one  of  Johnson's  happiest  illustra- 
tions. "When  some  one  said  in  his  presence  that  a  conge 
d'elire  might  be  considered  as  only  a  strong  recommenda- 
tion :  "  Sir,"  replied  Johnson,  "  it  is  such  a  recommenda- 
tion as  if  I  should  throw  you  out  of  a  two-pair  of  stairs 
window,  and  recommend  you  to  fall  soft." 

It  is  perhaps  time  to  cease  these  extracts  from  Boswell's 
reports.  The  next  two  years  were  less  fruitful.  In  1779 
Boswell  was  careless,  though  twice  in  London,  and  in 
1780,  he  did  not  pay  his  annual  visit.  Boswell  has 
partly  filled  up  the  gap  by  a  collection  of  sayings  made 
by  Langton,  some  passages  from  which  have  been 
quoted,  and  his  correspondence  gives  various  details. 
Garrick  died  in  January  of  1779,  and  Beauclerk  in 


iv.]  JOHNSON  AS  A  LITEEAEY  DICTATOR.  141 

March,  1780.  Johnson  himself  seems  to  have  shown 
few  symptoms  of  increasing  age;  but  a  change  was 
approaching,  and  the  last  years  of  his  life  were  destined 
to  be  clouded,  not  merely  by  physical  weakness,  but  by  a 
change  of  circumstances  which  had  great  influence  upon 
his  happiness. 


SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  CLOSING  YEARS   OP  JOHNSON'S   LIFE. 

IN  following  Boswell's  .guidance  we  have  necessarily  seen 
only  one  side  of  Johnson's  life;  and -probably  that  side 
which  had  least  significance  for  the  man  himself. 

Boswell  saw  in  him  chiefly  the  great  dictator  of  conver- 
sation ;  and  though  the  reports  of  Johnson's  talk  represent 
his  character  in  spite  of  some  qualifications  with  unusual 
fulness,  there  were  many  traits  very  inadequately  revealed 
at  the  Mitre  or  the  Club,  at  Mrs.  Thrale's,  or  in  meetings 
with  Wilkes  or  Eeynolds.  We  may  catch  some  glimpses 
from  his  letters  and  diaries  of  that  inward  life  which  con- 
sisted generally  in  a  long  succession  of  struggles  against  an 
oppressive  and  often  paralysing  melancholy.  Another 
most  'noteworthy  side  to  his  character  is  revealed  in  his 
relations  to  persons  too  humble  for  admission  to  the  tables 
at  which  he  exerted  a  despotic  sway.  Upon  this  side 
Johnson  was  almost  entirely  loveable.  \\re  often  have  to 
regret  the  imperfection  of  the  records  of 

That  best  portion  of  a  good  man's  life, 
His  little,  nameless,  tmremembered  acts 
Of  kindness  and  of  love. 

Everywhere  in  Johnson's  letter^  and  in  the  occasional 
anecdotes,  we  come  upon  indications  of  .a  tenderness 
and  untiring  benevolence  which  would  make  us  fonrive 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OP  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      143 

far  worse  faults  than  have  ever  been  laid  to  his  charge. 
Nay,  the  very  asperity  of  the  man's  outside  becomes  en- 
deared to  us  by  the  association.  His  irritability  never 
vented  itself  against  the  helpless,  and  his  rough  impa- 
tience of  fanciful  troubles  implied  no  want  of  sympathy 
for  real  sorrow.  One  of  Mrs.  Thrale's  anecdotes  is  in- 
tended to  show  Johnson's  harshness  : — "  When  I  one  day 
lamented  the  loss  of  a  first  cousin  killed  in  America, 
'  Pr'ythee,  my  dear,'  said  he,  '  have  done  with  canting ; 
how  would  the  world  be  the  worse  for  it,  I  may  ask,  if  all 
your  relations  were  at  once  spitted  like  larks  and  roasted 
for  Presto's  supper?'  Presto  was  the  dog  that  lay  under 
the  table  while  wo  talked."  The  counter  version,  given 
by  Boswell  is,  that  Mrs.  Thrale  related  her  cousin's  death 
in  the  midst  of  a  hearty  supper,  and  that  Johnson,  shocked 
at  her  want  of  feeling,  said,  "  Madam,  it  would  give  you 
very  little  concern  if  all  your  relations  were  spitted  like 
those  larks,  and  roasted  for  Presto's  supper."  Taking  the 
most  unfavourable  version,  we  may  judge  how  much  real 
indifference  to  human  sorrow  was  implied  by  seeing  how 
Johnson  was-  affected  by  a  loss  of  one  of  his  humblest 
friends.  It  is  but  one  case  of  many.  In  1767,  he  took 
leave,  as  he  notes  in  his  diary,  of  his  "  dear  old  friend, 
Catherine  Chambers,"  who  had  been  for  about  forty-three 
years  in  the  service  of  his  family.  "  I  desired  all  to  with- 
draw," he  says,  "  then  told  her  that  we  were  to  part  for 
ever,  and,  as  Christians,  we  should  part  with  prayer,  and 
that  I  would,  if  she  was  willing,  say  a  short  prayer  beside 
her.  She  expressed  great  desire  to  hear  me,  and  held  up  her 
poor  hands  as  she  lay  in  bed,  with  great  fervour,  while  I 
prayed,  kneeling  by  her,  in  nearly  the  following  words  " — 
which  shall,  not  be  repeated  here — :"  I  then  kissed  her," 
he  add&  "  She  told  me  that'to  part  was  the  greatest  pain 


144  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

that  she  had  ever  felt,  and  that  she  hoped  we  should  meet 
again  in  a  better  place.  I  expressed,  with  swelled  eyes, 
and  great  emotion  of  kindness,  the  same  hopes.  We 
kissed  and  parted — I  humbly  hope  to  meet  again  and  part 
no  more." 

A  man  with  so  true  and  tender  a  heart  could  say 
serenely,  what  with  some  men  would  be  a  mere  excuse  for 
want  of  sympathy,  that  he  "  hated  to  hear  people  whine 
about  metaphysical  distresses  when  there  was  so  much  want 
and  hunger  in  the  world."  He  had  a  sound  "and  righteous 
contempt  for  all  affectation  of  excessive  sensibility.  Sup- 
pose, said  Boswell  to  him,  whilst  their  common  friend 
Baretti  was  lying  under  a  charge  of  murder,  "  that  one  of 
your  intimate  friends  were  apprehended  for  an  offence  for 
which  he  might  be  hanged."  "  I  should  do  what  I  could," 
replied  Johnson,  "  to  bail  him,  and  give  him  any  other 
assistance ;  but  if  he  were  once  fairly  hanged,  I  should 
not  suffer."  "  Would  you  eat  your  dinner  that  day,  sir  ?  " 
asks  Boswell.  "  Yes,  sir ;  and  eat  it  as  if  he  were  eating 
with  me.  Why  there's  Baretti,  who's  to  be  tried  for  his 
life  to-morrow.  Friends  have  risen  up  for  him  upon  every 
side ;  yet  if  he  should  be  hanged,  none  of  them  will  eat  a 
slice  of  plum-pudding  the  less.  Sir,  that  sympathetic 
feeling  goes  a  very  little  way  in  depressing  the  mind." 
Boswell  illustrated  the  subject  by  saying  that  Tom  Davies 
had  just  written  a  letter  to  "Foote,  telling  him  that  he  could 
not  sleep  from  concern  about  Baretti,  and  at  the  same 
time  recommending  a  young  man  who  kept  'a  pickle-shop. 
Johnson  summed  up  by  the  remark :  "  You  will  find 
these  very  feeling  people  are  n'ot  very  ready  to  do  you 
good.  They  pay  you  by  feeling."  Johnson  never  objected 
to  feeling,  but  to  the  waste  of  feeling. 

In  a  similar  vein  he  told  Mrs.  Thrale  that  a  "  surly  fejl- 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      145 

low"  like  himself  had  no  compassion  to  spare  for  "wounds 
given  to  vanity  and  softness,"  whilst  witnessing  the  com- 
mon sight  of  actual  want  in  great  cities.  OnLady  Tavistock's 
death,  said  to  have  been  caused  by  grief  for  her  husband's 
loss,  he  observed  that  her  life  might  have  been  saved  if 
she  had  been  put  into  a  small  chandler's  shop,  with  a  child 
to  nurse.  When  Mrs.  Thrale  suggested  that  a  lady  would 
be  grieved  because  her  friend  had  lost  the  chance  of  a  for- 
tune, "  She  will  suffer  as  much,  perhaps,"  he  replied, 
"as  your  horse  did  when  your  cow  miscarried."  Mrs. 
Thrale  testifies  that  he  once  reproached  her  sternly  for 
complaining  of  the  dust.  When  he  knew,  he  said,  how 
many  poor  families  would  perish  next  winter  for  want 
of  the  bread  which  the  drought  woxild  deny,  he  could 
not  bear  to  hear  ladies  sighing  for  rain  on  account  of  their 
complexions  or  their  clothes.  While  reporting  such  say- 
ings, she  adds,  that  he  loved  the  poor  as  she  never  saw  any 
one  else  love  them,  with  an  earnest  desire  to  make  them 
happy.  His  charity  was  unbounded;  he  proposed  to 
allow  himself  one  hundred  a  year  out  of  the  three  hundred, 
of  his  pension ;  but  the  Thrales  could  never  discover  that 
ho  really  spent  upon  himself  more  than  70?.,  or  at  most 
SOL  He  had  numerous  dependants,  abroad  as  well  as  at 
home,  who  "  did  not  like  to  see  him  latterly,  unless  he 
brought  'em  money."  He  filled  his  pockets  with  small 
cash  which  he  distributed  to"  beggars  in-  defiance  of  political 
economy.  Whpn  told  that  the  recipients  only  laid  it  out 
upon  gin  or  tobacco,  he  replied  that  it  was  savage  to  deny 
them  the  few  coarse  pleasures  which  the  richer  disdained. 
Numerous  instances  are  given  of  more  judicious  charity. 
When,  for  example,  a  Benedictine  monk,  whom  he  had 
seen  in  Paris,  became  a  Protestant,  Johnson  supported 
him  for  some  months  in  London,  till  he  could  get  a  living. 


146  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Once  coming  home  late  at  night,  he  found  a  poor  woman 
lying  in  the  street.  He  carried  her  to  his  house  on  his 
back,  and  found  that  she  was  reduced  to  the  lowest  stage 
of  want,  poverty,  and  disease.  He  took  care  of  her  at  his 
own  charge,  with  all  tenderness,  until  she  was  restored 
to  health,  and  tried  to  have  her  put  into  a  virtuous  way  of 
living.  His  house,  in  his  later  years,  was  filled  with 
various  waifs  and  strays,  to  whom  he  gave  hospitality  and 
sometimes  support,  defending  himself  by  saying  that  if  he 
did  not  help  them  nobody  else  would.  The  head  of  his 
household  was  Miss  Williams,  who  had  been  a  friend  of 
his  wife's,  and  after  coming  to  stay  with  him,  in  order  to 
undergo  an  operation  for  cataract,  became  a  permanent 
inmate  of  his  house.  She  had  a  small  income  of  some 
40Z.  a  year,  partly  from  the  charity  of  connexions  of  her 
father's,  and  partly  arising  from  a  little  book  of  miscel- 
lanies published  by  subscription.  She  was  a  woman  of 
some  sense  and  cultivation,  and  when  she  died  (in  1783) 
Johnson  said  that  for  thirty  years  she  had  been  to  him  as 
a  sister.  Boswell's  jealousy  was  excited  during  the  first 
period  of  his  acquaintance,  when  Goldsmith  one  night 
went  home  with  Johnson,  crying  "  I  go  to  Miss  Williams  " 
— a  phrase  which  implied  admission  to  an  intimacy  from 
which  Boswell  was  as  yet  excluded.  Boswell  soon  obtained 
the  coveted  privilege,  and  testifies  to  the  respect  with 
which  Johnson  always  treated  the  inmates  of  his  family. 
Before  leaving  her  to  dine  with  Boswell  at  the  hotel,  he 
asked  her  what  little  delicacy  should  be  sent  to  her  from 
the  tavern.  Poor  Miss  Williams,  however,  was  peevish, 
and,  according  to  Hawkins,  had  been  known  to  drive  John- 
son out  of  the  room  by  her  reproaches,  and  Boswell's 
delicacy  was  shocked  by  the  supposition  that  she  tested  the 
fulness  of  cups  of  tea,  by  putting  her  finger  inside.  We  are 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  TEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.     147 

glad  to  know  that  this  was  a  false  impression,  and,  in 
fact,  Miss  Williams,  however  unfortunate  in  temper  and 
circumstances,  seems  to  have  been  a  lady  by  manners  and 
education. 

The  next  inmate  of  this  queer  household  was  Robert 
Levett,  a  man  who  had  been  a  waiter  at  a  coffee-house  in 
Paris  frequented  by  surgeons.  They  had  enabled  him  to 
pick  up  some  of  their  art,  and  he  set  up  as  an  "  obscure 
practiser  in  physic  amongst  the  lower  people  "  in  London. 
He  took  from  them  such  fees  as  he  could  get,  including 
provisions,  sometimes,  unfortunately  for  him,  of  the 
potable  kind.  He  was  once  entrapped  into  a  queer  mar- 
riage, and  Johnson  had  to  arrange  a  separation  from  his 
wife.  Johnson,  it  seems,  had  a  good  opinion  of  his 
medical  skill,  and  more  or  less  employed  his  services  in 
that  capacity.  He  attended  his  patron  at  his  breakfast ; 
breakfasting,  said  Percy,  "  on  the  crust  of  a  roll,  which 
Johnson  threw  to  him  after  tearing  out  the  crumb."  The 
phrase,  it  is  said,  goes  too  far  ;  Johnson  always  took  pains 
that  Levett  should  be  treated  rather  as  a  friend  than  as  a 
dependant. 

Besides  these  humble  friends,  there  was  a  Mrs.  Des- 
moulins,  the  daughter  of  a  Lichfield  physician.  Johnson 
had  had  some  quarrel  with  the  father  in  his  youth  for 
revealing  a  confession  of  the  mental  disease  which  tortured 
him  from  early  years.  He  supported  Mrs.  Desmoulins 
none  the  less,  giving  house-room  to  her  and  her  daughter, 
and  making  her  an  allowance  of  half-a-guinea  a  week,  a 
sum  equal  to  a  twelfth  part  of  his  pension.  Francis 
Barber  has  already  been  mentioned,  and  we  have  a  dim 
vision  of  a  Miss  Carmichael,  who  completed  what  he 
facetiously  called  his  "seraglio."  It  was  anything  but  a 
happy  family.  He  summed  up  their  relations  in  a  letter 


148  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

to  Mrs.  Thrale.  "  Williams,"  he  says,  "  hates  everybody  ; 
Levett  hates  Desmoulins,  and  does  not  love  Williams ; 
Desmoulins  hates  them  both ;  Poll  (Miss  Carmichael) 
loves  none  of  them."  Frank  Barber  complained  of  Miss 
Williams's  authority,  and  Miss  Williams  of  Frank's  in- 
subordination. Intruders  -who  had  taken  refuge  under 
his  roof,  brought  their  children  there  in  his  absence,  and 
grumbled  if  their  dinners  were  ill-dressed.  The  old  man 
bore  it  all,  relieving  himself  by  an  occasional  growl,  but 
reproaching  any  who  ventured  to  join  in  the  growl  for 
their  indifference  to  the  sufferings  of  poverty.  Levett 
died  in  January,  1782  ;  Miss  Williams  died,  after  a  linger- 
ing illness,  in  1783,  and  Johnson  grieved  in  solitude  for 
the  loss  of  his  testy  companions.  A  poem,  composed 
upon  Levett's  death,  records  his  feelings  in  language  which 
wants  the  refinement  of  Goldsmith  or  the  intensity  of 
Cowper's  pathos,  but  which  is  yet  so  sincere  and  tender 
as  to  be  more  impressive  than  far  more  elegant  compo- 
sitions. It  will  be  a  fitting  close  to  this  brief  indication 
of  one  side  of  Johnson's  character,  too  easily  overlooked 
in  Boswell's  pages,  to  quote  part  of  what  Thackeray  truly 
calls  the  "  sacred  verses  "  upon  Levett : — 

Well  tried  through  many  a  varying  year 

See  Levett  to  the  grave  descend, 
Officious,  innocent,  sincere, 

Of  every  friendless  name  the  friend. 

In  misery's  darkest  cavern  known, 

His  ready  help  was  ever  nigh ; 
Where  hopeless  anguish  pour*d  his  groan, 

And  lonely  \vant  retired  to  die. 

No  summons  mock'd  by  dull  delay, 

No  petty  gains  disdain'd  by  pride ; 
The  modest  wants  of  every  day, 

The  toil  of  every  day  supplied. 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  TEARS  OP  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      149 

His  virtues  walk'd  their  narrow  round, 

Nor  made  a  pause,  nor  left  a  void ; 
And  sure  the  eternal  Master  found 

His  single  talent  well  employ'd. 

The  busy  day,  the  peaceful  night, 

Unfelt,  uncounted,  glided  by  j 
His  frame  was  firm,  his  eye  was  bright, 

Though  now  his  eightieth  year  was  nigh. 

Then,  with  no  throbs  of  fiery  pain, 

No  cold  gradations  of  decay, 
Death  broke  at  once  the  vital  chain, 

And  freed  his  soul  the  easiest  way. 

The  last  stanza  smells  somewhat  of  the  country  tomb- 
stone ;  but  to  read  the  whole  and  to  realize  the  deep, 
manly  sentiment  which  it  implies,  without  tears  in  one's 
eyes  is  to  me  at  least  impossible. 

There  is  one  little  touch  which  may  be  added  before  we 
proceed  to  the  closing  years  of  this  tender-hearted  old 
moralist.  Johnson  loved  little  children,  calling  them 
"little  dears,"  and  cramming  them  with  sweetmeats, 
though  we  regret  to  add  that  he  once  snubbed  a  little 
child  rather  severely  for  a  want  of  acquaintance  with  the 
Pilgrim's  Progress.  His  cat,  Hodge,  should  be  famous 
amongst  the  lovers  of  the  race.  He  used  to  go  out  and 
buy  oysters  for  Hodge,  that  the  servants  might  not  take 
a  dislike  to  the  animal  from  having  to  serve  it  themselves. 
He  reproached  his  wife  for  beating  a  cat  before  the  maid, 
lest  she  should  give  a  precedent  for  cruelty.  Boswell, 
who  cherished  an  antipathy  to  cats,  suffered  at  seeing 
Hodge  scrambling  up  Johnson's  breast,  whilst  he 
smiled  and  rubbed  the  beast's  back  and  pulled  its  tail. 
Bozzy  remarked  that  he  was  a  fine  cat.  "  Why,  yes,  sir," 
said  Johnson  ;  "  but  I  have  had  cats  whom  I  liked  better 


150  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAI». 

than  this,"  and  then,  lest  Hodge  should  be  put  out  of 
countenance,  he  added,  "  but  he  is  a  very  fine  cat,  a  very 
fine  cat  indeed."  He  told  Langton  once  of  a  young 
gentleman  who,  when  last  heard  of,  was  "running  about 
town  shooting  cats;  but,"  he  murmured  in  a  kindly 
reverie,  "  Hodge  shan't  be  shot ;  no,  no,  Hodge  shall 
not  be  shot ! "  Once,  when  Johnson  was  staying  at  a 
house  in  Wales,-  the  gardener  brought  in  a  hare  which  had 
been  caught  in  the  potatoes.  The  order  was  given  to 
take  it  to  the  cook.  Johnson  asked  to  have  it  placed  in 
his  arms.  He  took  it  to  the  window  and  let  it  go,  shout- 
ing to  increase  its  speed.  When  his  host  complained 
that  he  had  perhaps  spoilt  the  dinner,  Johnson  replied 
by  insisting  that  the  rights  of  hospitality  included  an 
animal  which  had  thus  placed  itself  under  the  protection 
of  the  master  of  the  garden. 

We  must  proceed,  however,  to  a  more  serious  event. 
The  year  1781  brought  with  it  a  catastrophe  which  pro- 
foundly affected  the  brief  remainder  of  Johnson's  life. 
Mr.  Thrale,  whose  health  had  been  shaken  by  fits,  died 
suddenly  on  the  4th  of  April.  The  ultimate  consequence 
was  Johnson's  loss  of  the  second  home,  in  which  he  had 
so  often  found  refuge  from  melancholy,  alleviation  of 
physical  suffering,  and  pleasure  in  social  converse.  The 
change  did  not  follow  at  once,  but  as  the  catastrophe  of  a 
little  social  drama,  upon  the  rights  and  wrongs  of  which 
a  good  deal  of  controversy  has  been  expended. 

Johnson  was  deeply  affected  by  the  loss  of  a  friend 
whose  face,  as  he  said,  "  had  never  been  turned  upon  him 
through  fifteen  years  but  with  respect  and  benignity." 
He  wrote  solemn  and  affecting  letters  to  the  widow,  and 
busied  himself  strenuously  in  her  service.  Thrale  had 
made  him  one  of  his  executors,  leaving  him  a  small 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OP  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      151 

legacy;  and  Johnson  took,  it  seems,  a  rather  simple- 
minded  pleasure  in  dealing  with  important  commercial 
affairs  and  signing  cheques  for  large  sums  of  money.  The 
old  man  of  letters,  to  whom  three  hundred  a  year  had 
been  superabundant  wealth,  was  amused  at  finding  himself 
in  the  position  of  a  man  of  business,  regulating  what  was 
then  regarded  as  a  princely  fortune.  The  brewery  was 
sold  after  a  time,  and  Johnson  bustled  about  with  an  ink- 
horn  and  pen  in  his  button-hole.  When  asked  what  was 
the  value  of  the  property,  he  replied  magniloquently, 
"  We  are  not  here  to  sell  a  parcel  of  boilers  and  vats,  but 
the  potentiality  of  growing  rich  beyond  the  dreams  of 
avarice."  The  brewery  was  in  fact  sold  to  Barclay, 
Perkins,  and  Co.  for  the  sum  of  135,000?.,  and  some 
years  afterwards  it  was  the  largest  concern  of  the  kind  in 
the  world. 

The  first  effect  of  the  change  was  probably  rather  to 
tighten  than  to  relax  the  bond  of  union  with  the  Thrale 
family.  During  the  winter  of  1781-2,  Johnson's  in- 
firmities were  growing  upon  him.  In  the  beginning  of 
1782  he  was  suffering  from  an  illness  which  excited 
serious  apprehensions,  and  he  went  to  Mrs.  Thrale's,  as  the 
only  house  where  he  could  use  "  all  the  freedom  that 
sickness  requires."  She  nursed  him  carefully,  and  ex- 
pressed her  feelings  with  characteristic  vehemence  in  a 
curious  journal  which  he  had  encouraged  her  to  keep.  It 
records  her  opinions  about  her  affairs  and  her  family,  with 
a  frankness  remarkable  even  in  writing  intended  for  no 
eye  but  her  own.  "Here  is  Mr.  Johnson  very  ill,"  she 
writes  on  the  1st  of  February ;  . .  .  .  "What  shall  we  do 
for  him  ?  If  I  lose  Mm,  I  am  more  than  undone — friend, 
father,  guardian,  confidant !  God  give  me  health  and 
patience!  What  shall  I  do?"  There  is  no  reason  to 


152  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CUAP. 

doubt  the  sincerity  of  these  sentiments,  though  they  seem 
to  represent  a  mood  of  excitement.  They  show  that  for 
ten  months  after  Thrale's  death  Mrs.  Thrale  was  keenly 
sensitive  to  the  value  of  Johnson's  friendship. 

A  change,  however,  was  approaching.  Towards  the 
end  of  1780  Mrs.  Thrale  had  made  the  acquaintance  of  an 
Italian  musician  named  Piozzi,  a  man  of  amiable  and 
honourable  character,  making  an  independent  income  by 
his  profession,  but  to  the  eyes  of  most  people  rather  in- 
offensive than  specially  attractive.  The  friendship  between 
Mrs.  Thrale  and  Piozzi  rapidly  became  closer,  and  by  the 
end  of  1781  she  was  on  very  intimate  terms  with  the 
gentleman  whom  she  calls  "  my  Piozzi."  He  had  been 
making  a  professional  trip  to  the  Continent  during  part 
of  the  period  since  her  husband's  death,  and  upon  his 
return  in  November,  Johnson  congratulated  her  upon  having 
two  friends  who  loved  her,  in  terms  which  suggest  no 
existing  feeling  of  jealousy.  During  1782  the  mutual 
affection  of  the  lady  and  the  musician  became  stronger, 
and  in  the  autumn  they  had  avowed  it  to  each  other,  and 
were  discussing  the  question  of  marriage. 

No  one  who  has  had  some  experience  of  life  will  be 
inclined  to  condemn  Mrs.  Thrale  for  her  passion.  Rather 
the  capacity  for  a  passion  not  excited  by  an  intrinsically 
unworthy  object  should  increase  our  esteem  for  her.  Her 
marriage  with  Thrale  had  been,  as  has  been  said,  one  of 
convenience ;  and,  though  she  bore  him  many  children 
and  did  her  duty  faithfully,  she  never  loved  him.  To- 
wards the  end  of  his  life  he  had  made  her  jealous  by  very 
marked  attentions  to  the  pretty  and  sentimental  Sophy 
Streatfield,  which  once  caused  a  scene  at  his  table ;  and 
during  the  last  two  years  Hs  mind  had  been  weakened, 
and  his  conduct  had  caused  her  anxiety  and  discomfort, 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.       153 

It  is  not  surprising  that  she  should  welcome  the  warm 
and  simple  devotion  of  her  new  lover,  though  she  was  of 
a  ripe  age  and  the  mother  of  grown-up  daughters. 

It  is,  however,  equally  plain  that  an  alliance  with  a 
foreign  fiddler  was  certain  to  shock  British  respectability. 
It  is  the  old  story  of  the  quarrel  between  Philistia  and 
Bohemia.  Nor  was  respectability  without  much  to  say 
for  itself.  Piozzi  was  a  Catholic  as  well  as  a  foreigner ; 
to  marry  him  was  in  all  probability  to  break  with  daugh- 
ters just  growing  into  womanhood,  whom  it  was  obviously 
her  first  duty  to  protect.  The  marriage,  therefore,  might 
be  regarded  as  not  merely  a  revolt  against  conventional 
morality,  but  as  leading  to  a  desertion  of  country,  religion, 
and  family.  Her  children,  her  husband's  friends,  and  her 
whole  circle  were  certain  to  look  upon  the  match  with 
feelings  of  the  strongest  disapproval,  and  she  admitted  to 
herself  that  the  objections  were  founded  upon  something 
more  weighty  than  a  fear  of  the  world's  censure. 

Johnson,  in  particular,  among  whose  virtues  onfc 
cannot  reckon  a  superiority  to  British  prejudice,  would 
inevitably  consider  the  marriage  as  simply  degrading. 
Foreseeing  this,  and  wishing  to  avoid  the  pain  of  rejecting 
advice  which  she  felt  unable  to  accept,  she  refrained 
from  retaining  her  "  friend,  father,  and  guardian  "  in  the 
position  of  "  confidant."  Her  situation  in  the  summer  of 
1782  was  therefore  exceedingly  trying.  She  was  unhappy 
at  home.  Her  children,  she  complains,  did  not  love  her; 
her  servants  "  devoured  "  her ;  her  friends  censured  her ; 
and  her  expenses  were  excessive,  whilst  the  loss  of  a 
lawsuit  strained  her  resources.  Johnson,  sickly,  suffering 
and  descending  into  the  gloom  of  approaching  decay, 
was  present  like  a  charged  thunder-cloud  ready  to  burst 
at  p.ny  moment,  if  she  allowed  him  to  approach  the  chief 


154  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

subject  of  her  thoughts.  Though  not  in  love  with  Mrs. 
Thrale,  he  had  a  very  intelligible  feeling  of  jealousy 
towards  any  one  who  threatened  to  distract  her  allegiance. 
Under  such  circumstances  we  might  expect  the  state  of 
things  which  Miss  Burney  described  long  afterwards 
(though  with  some  confusion  of  dates).  Mrs.  Thrale, 
she  says,  was  absent  and  agitated,  restless  in  manner, 
and  hurried  in  speech,  forcing  smiles,  and  averting  her 
eyes  from  her  friends ;  neglecting  every  one,  including 
Johnson  and  excepting  only  Miss  Burney  herself,  to 
whom  the  secret  was  confided,  and  the  situation  therefore 
explained.  Gradually,  according  to  Miss  Burney,  she 
became  more  petulant  to  Johnson  than  she  was  herself 
aware,  gave  palpable  hints  of  being  worried  by  his  com- 
pany, and  finally  excited  his  resentment  and  suspicion. 
In  one  or  two  utterances,  though  he  doubtless  felt  the 
expedience  of  reserve,  he  intrusted  his  forebodings  to 
Miss  Burney,  and  declared  that  Streatham  was  lost  to 
him  for  ever. 

At  last,  in  the  end  of  August,  the  crisis  came.  Mrs. 
Thrale's  lawsuit  had  gone  against  her.  She  thought  it 
desirable  to  go  abroad  and  save  money.  It  had  more- 
over been  "  long  her  dearest  wish "  to  see  Italy,  with 
Piozzi  for  a  guide.  The  one  difficulty  (as  she  says  in  her 
journal  at  the  time),  was  that  it  seemed  equally  hard  to 
part  with  Johnson  or  to  take  him  with  her  till  he  had 
regained  strength.  At  last,  however  she  took  courage  to 
confide  to  him  her  plans  for  travel.  To  her  extreme  an 
noyance  he  fully  approved  of  them.  He  advised  her  to 
go  ;  anticipated  her  return  in  two  or  three  years  ;  and  told 
her  daughter  that  he  should  not  accompany  them,  even  if 
invited.  No  behaviour,  it  may  bo  admitted,  could  be 
more  provoking  than  this  unforeseen  reasonableness.  To 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      155 

nerve  oneself  to  part  with  a  friend,  and  to  find 
the  friend  perfectly  ready,  and  all  your  battery  of  argu- 
ment thrown  away  is  most  vexatious.  The  poor  man 
should  have  begged  her  to  stay  with  him,  or  to  take  him 
with  her;  he  should  have  made  the  scene  which  she 
professed  to  dread,  but  which  would  have  been  the  best 
proof  of  her  power.  The  only  conclusion  which  could 
really  have  satisfied  her — though  she,  in  all  probability,  did 
not  know  it — would  have  been  an  outburst  which  would 
have  justified  a  rupture,  and  allowed  her  to  protest  against 
his  tyranny  as  she  now  proceeded  to  protest  against  his 
complacency. 

Johnson  wished  to  go  to  Italy  two  years  later ;  and 
his  present  willingness  to  be  left  was  probably  caused 
by  a  growing  sense  of  the  dangers  which  threatened 
their  friendship.  Mrs.  Thrale's  anger  appears  in  her 
journal.  He  had  never  really  loved  her,  she  declares ; 
his  affection  for  her  had  been  interested,  though  even 
in  her  wrath  she  admits  that  he  really  loved  her  husband  ; 
he  cared  less  for  her  conversation,  which  she  had  fancied 
necessary  to  his  existence,  than  for  her  "  roast  beef  and 
plumb  pudden,"  which  he  now  devours  too  "dirtily 
for  endurance."  She  was  fully  resolved  to  go,  and  yet  she 
could  not  bear  that  her  going  should  fail  to  torture  the 
friend  whom  for  eighteen  years  she  had  loved  and 
cherished  so  kindly. 

No  one  has  a  right  at  once  to  insist  upon  the  compliance 
of  his  friends,  and  to  insist  that  it  should  be  a  painful 
compliance.  Still  Mrs.  Thrale's  petulant  outburst  was 
natural  enough.  It  requires  notice  because  her  subse- 
quent account  of  ihe  rupture  has  given  rise  to  attacks  on 
Johnson's  character.  Her  "Anecdotes,"  written  in  1785, 
show  that  her  real  affection  for  Johnson  was  still  coloured 


156  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

by  resentment  for  his  conduct  at  this  and  a  later  period. 
They  have  an  apologetic  character  which  shows  itself  in  a 
statement  as  to  the  origin  of  the  quarrel,  curiously 
different  from  the  contemporary  accounts  in  the  diary. 
She  says  substantially,  and  the  whole  hook  is  written  so 
as  to  give  probability  to  the  assertion,  that  Johnson's 
bearishness  and  demands  upon  her  indulgence  had  become 
intolerable,  when  he  was  no  longer  under  restraint  from 
her  husband's  presence.  She  therefore  "  took  advantage  " 
of  her  lost  lawsuit  and  other  troubles  to  leave  London, 
and  thus  escape  from  his  domestic  tyranny.  He  no 
longer,  as  she  adds,  suffered  from  anything  but  "  old  age 
and  general  infirmity  "  (a  tolerably  wide  exception  !),  and 
did  not  require  her  nursing.  She  therefore  withdrew 
from  the  yoke  to  which  she  had  contentedly  submitted 
during  her  husband's  life,  but  which  was  intolerable  when 
her  "  coadjutor  was  no  more." 

Johnson's  society  was,  we  may  easily  believe,  very 
trying  to  a  widow  in  such  a  position  ;  and  it  seems  to  be 
true  that  Thrale  was  better  able  than  Mrs.  Thrale  to  restrain 
his  oddities,  little  as  the  lady  shrunk  at  times  from  reason- 
able plain-speaking.  But  the  later  account  involves  some- 
thing more  than  a  bare  suppression  of  the  truth.  The 
excuse  about  his  health  is,  perhaps,  the  worst  part  of 
her  case,  because  obviously  insincere.  Nobody  could  be 
more  fully  aware  than  Mrs.  Thrale  that  Johnson's  infir- 
mities were  rapidly  gathering,  and  that  another  winter  or 
two  must  in  all  probability  be  fatal  to  him.  She  knew, 
therefore,  that  he  was  never  more  in  want  of  the  care 
which,  as  she  seems  to  imply,  had  saved  him  from  the 
specific  tendency  to  something  like  madness.  She  knew, 
in  fact,  that  she  was  throwing  him  upon  the  care  of  his 
other  friends,  zealous  and  affectionate  enough,  it  is  true, 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OP  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.       157 

but  yet  unable  to  supply  him  with  the  domestic  comforts 
of  Streatham.  She  clearly  felt  that  this  was  a  real  in- 
jury, inevitable  it  might  be  under  the  circumstances,  but 
certainly  not  to  be  extenuated  by  the  paltry  evasion  as  to 
his  improved  health.  So  far  from  Johnson's  health  being 
now  established,  she  had  not  dared  to  speak  until  his 
temporary  recovery  from  a  dangerous  illness,  which  had 
provoked  her  at  the  time  to  the  strongest  expressions  of 
anxious  regret.  She  had  (according  to  the  diary)  regarded 
a  possible  breaking  of  the  yoke  in  the  early  part  of  1782 
as  a  terrible  evil,  which  would  "more  than  ruin  her." 
Even  when  resolved  to  leave  Streatham,  her  one  great 
difficulty  is  the  dread  of  parting  with  Johnson,  and  the 
pecuniary  troubles  are  the  solid  and  conclusive  reason. 
In  the  later  account  the  money  question  is  the  mere  pre- 
text ;  the  desire  to  leave  Johnson  the  true  motive ;  and 
the  long-cherished  desire  to  see  Italy  with  Piozzi  is  judi- 
ciously dropped  out  of  notice  altogether. 

The  truth  is  plain  enough.  Mrs.  Thrale  was  torn  by 
conflicting  feelings.  She  still  loved  Johnson,  and  yet 
dreaded  his  certain  disapproval  of  her  strongest  wishes. 
She  respected  him,  but  was  resolved  not  to  follow  his 
advice.  She  wished  to  treat  him  with  kindness  and  to  be 
repaid  with  gratitude,  and  yet  his  presence  and  his  affec- 
tion were  full  of  intolerable  inconveniences.  When  an 
old  friendship  becomes  a  burden,  the  smaller  infirmities  of 
manner  and  temper  to  which  we  once  submitted  willingly, 
become  intolerable.  She  had  borne  with  Johnson's  modes 
of  eating  and  with  his  rough  reproofs  to  herself  and  her 
friends  during  sixteen  years  of  her  married  life ;  and  for 
nearly  a  year  of  her  widowhood  she  still  clung  to  him  as 
the  wisest  and  kindest  of  monitors.  His  manners  had 
undergone  no  spasmodic  change.  They  became  intolerable 


158  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

when,  for  other  reasons,  she  resented  his  possible  inter- 
ference, and  wanted  a  very  different  guardian  and  con- 
fidant ;  and,  therefore,  she  wished  to  part,  and  yet  wished 
that  the  initiative  should  corne  from  him. 

The  decision  to  leave  Streatham  was  taken.  Johnson 
parted  with  deep  regret  from  the  house  ;  he  read  a  chapter 
of  the  Testament  in  the  library ;  he  took  leave  of  the 
church  with  a  kiss ;  he  composed  a  prayer  commending 
the  family  to  the  protection  of  Heaven ;  and  he  did  not 
forget  to  note  in  his  journal  the  details  of  the  last  dinner 
of  which  he  partook.  This  quaint  observation  may 
have  been  due  to  some  valetudinary  motive,  or,  more  pro- 
bably, to  some  odd  freak  of  association.  Once,  when 
eating  an  omelette,  he  was  deeply  affected  because  it 
recalled  his  old  friend  Nugent.  "  Ah,  my  dear  friend," 
he  said  "  in  an  agony,"  "  I  shall  never  eat  omelette  with 
thee  again  ! "  And  in  the  present  case  there  is  an  obscure 
reference  to  some  funeral  connected  in  his  mind  with  a 
meal.  The  unlucky  entry  has  caused  soms  ridicule,  but 
need  hardly  convince  us  that  his  love  of  the  family  in 
which  for  so  many  years  he  had  been  an  honoured  and 
honour-giving  inmate  was,,  as  Miss  Seward  amiably  sug- 
gests, in  great  measure  "  kitchen-love." 

No  immediate  rupture  followed  the  abandonment  of 
the  Streatham  establishment.  Johnson  spent  some  weeks 
at  Brighton  with  Mrs.  Thrale,  during  which  a  crisis  was 
taking  place,  without  his  knowledge,  in  her  relations  to 
Piozzi.  After  vehement  altercations  with  her  daughters, 
whom  she  criticizes  with  great  bitterness  for  their  utter 
want  of  heart,  she  resolved  to  break  with  Piozzi  for  at 
least  a  time.  Her  plan  was  to  go  to  Bath,  and  there  to 
retrench  her  expenses,  in  the  hopes  of  being  able  to  recall 
her  lover  at  some  future  period.  Meanwhile  he  left  her 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEAES  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.       159 

and  returned  to  Italy.  After  another  winter  in  London, 
during  which.  Johnson  was  still  a  frequent  inmate  of  her 
house,  she  went  to  Bath  with  her  daughters  in  April, 
1783.  A  melancholy  period  followed  for  both  the  friends. 
Mrs.  Thrale  lost  a  younger  daughter,  and  Johnson  had  a 
paralytic  stroke  in  June.  Death  was  sending  preliminary 
warnings.  A  correspondence  was  kept  up,  which  implies 
that  the  old  terms  were  not  ostensibly  broken.  Mrs. 
Thrale  speaks  tartly  more  than  once ;  and  Johnson's  letters 
go  into  medical  details  with  his  customary  plainness  of 
speech,  and  he  occasionally  indulges  in  laments  over  the 
supposed  change  in  her  feelings.  The  gloom  is  thicken- 
ing, and  the  old  playful  gallantry  has  died  out.  The  old 
man  evidently  felt  himself  deserted,  and  suffered  from  the 
breakiug-up  of  the  asylum  he  had  loved  so  well.  The 
final  catastrophe  came  in  1784,  less  than  six  months 
before  Johnson's  death. 

After  much  suffering  in  mind  and  body,  Mrs.  Thrale 
had  at  last  induced  her  daughters  to  consent  to  her  mar- 
riage with  Piozzi.  She  sent  for  him  at  once,  and  they 
were  married  in  June,  1784.  A  painful  correspondence 
followed.  Mrs.  Thrale  announced  her  marriage  in  a 
friendly  letter  to  Johnson,  excusing  her  previous  silence 
on  the  ground  that  discussion  could  only  have  caused 
them  pain.  The  revelation,  though  Johnson  could  not 
have  been  quite  unprepared,  produced  one  of  his  bursts  of 
fury.  "  Madam,  if  I  interpret  your  letter  rightly,"  wrote 
the  old  man,  "  you  are  ignominiously  married.  If  it  is 
yet  undone,  let  us  once  more  talk  together.  If  you  have 
abandoned  your  children  and  your  religion,  God  forgive 
your  wickedness !  If  you  have  forfeited  your  fame  and 
your  country,  may  your  folly  do  no  further  mischief !  If 
the  last  act  is  yet  to  do,  I,  who  have  loved  you,  esteemed 


160  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

you,  reverenced  you,  and  served  you — I,  who  long  thought 
you  the  first  of  womankind — entreat  that  before  your  fate 
is  irrevocable,  I  may  once  more  see  you  !  I  was,  I  once 
was,  madam,  most  truly  yours,  Sam.  Johnson." 

Mrs.  Thrale  replied  with  spirit  and  dignity  to  this  cry 
of  blind  indignation,  speaking  of  her  husband  with  be- 
coming pride,  and  resenting  the  unfortunate  phrase  about 
her  loss  of  "fame."  She  ended  by  declining  further 
intercourse  till  Johnson  could  change  his  opinion  of 
Piozzi.  Johnson  admitted  in  his  reply  that  he  had  no 
right  to  resent  her  conduct ;  expressed  his  gratitude  for 
the  kindness  which  had  "  soothed  twenty  years  of  a  life 
radically  wretched,"  and  implored  her  ("  superfluously,"  as 
she  says)  to  induce  Piozzi  to  settle  in  England.  He  then 
took  leave  of  her  with  an  expression  of  sad  forebodings. 
Mrs.  Thrale,  now  Mrs.  Piozzi,  says  that  she  replied  affec- 
tionately ;  but  the  letter  is  missing.  The  friendship  was 
broken  off,  and  during  the  brief  remainder  of  Johnson's 
life,  the  Piozzis  were  absent  from  England. 

Of  her  there  is  little  more  to  be  said.  After  passing 
some  time  in  Italy,  where  she  became  a  light  of  that 
wretched  little  Delia  Cruscan  society  of  which  some 
faint  memory  is  preserved  by  Gifford's  ridicule,  now  pretty 
nearly  forgotten  with  its  objects,  she  returned  with  her 
husband  to  England.  Her  anecdotes  of  Johnson,  pub- 
lished soon  after  his  death,  had  a  success  which,  in  spite 
of  much  ridicule,  encouraged  her  to  some  further  literary 
efforts  of  a  sprightly  but  ephemeral  kind.  She  lived 
happily  with  Piozzi,  and  never  had  cause  to  regret  her 
marriage.  She  was  reconciled  to  her  daughters  sufficiently 
to  renew  a  friendly  intercourse  ;  but  the  elder  ones  set  up 
a  separate  establishment.  Piozzi  died  not  long  after- 
wards. She  was  still  a  vivacious  old  lady,  who  celebrated 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEAES  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.       161 

her  80th  birthday  by  a  hall,  and  is  supposed  at  that  ripe 
age  to  have  made  an  offer  of  marriage  to  a  young  actor. 
She  died  in  May,  1821,  leaving  all  that  she  could  dispose 
of  to  a  nephew  of  Piozzi's,  who  had  "been  naturalised 
in  England. 

Meanwhile  Johnson  was  rapidly  approaching  the  grave. 
His  old  inmates,  Levett  and  Miss  Williams,  had  gone 
before  him  ;  Goldsmith  and  Garrick  and  Beauclerk  had 
become  memories  of  the  past ;  and  the  gloom  gathered 
thickly  around  him.  The  old  man  clung  to  life  with 
pathetic  earnestness.  Though  life  had  been  often  melan- 
choly, he  never  affected  to  conceal  the  horror  with  which 
he  regarded  death.  He  frequently  declared  that  death 
must  be  dreadful  to  every  reasonable  man.  "  Death,  my 
dear,  is  very  dreadful,"  he  says  simply  in  a  letter  to  Lucy 
Porter  in  the  last  year  of  his  life.  Still  later  he  shocked 
ft  pious  friend  by  admitting  that  the  fear  oppressed  him. 
Dr.  Adams  tried  the  ordinary  consolation  of  the  divine 
goodness,  and  went  so  far  as  to  suggest  that  hell  might 
not  imply  much  positive  suffering.  Johnson's  religious 
views  were  of  a  different  colour.  "  I  am  afraid,"  he  said, 
"  I  may  be  one  of  those  who  shall  be  damned."  "  What 
do  you  mean  by  damned?"  asked  Adams.  Johnson  re- 
plied passionately  and  loudly,  "  Sent  to  hell,  sir,  and 
punished  everlastingly."  Remonstrances  only  deepened 
his  melancholy,  and  he  silenced  his  friends  by  exclaiming 
in  gloomy  agitation,  "  I'll  have  no  more  on't !"  Often  in 
these  last  years  he  was  heard  muttering  to  himself  the 
passionate  complaint  of  Claudio,  "  Ah,  but  to  die  and  go 
we  know  not  whither !"  At  other  times  he  was  speaking 
of  some  lost  friend,  and  saying,  "  Poor  man — and  then  he 
died !"  The  peculiar  horror  of  death,  which  seems  to 
indicate  a  tinge  of  insanity,  Avas  combined  with  utter 
8 


162  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

fearlessness  of  pain.  Ho  called  to  the  surgeons  to  cut 
deeper  when  performing  a  painful  operation,  and  shortly 
before  his  death  inflicted  such  wounds  upon  himself  in 
hopes  of  obtaining  relief  as,  very  erroneously,  to  suggest 
the  idea  of  suicide.  "Whilst  his  strength  remained,  he 
endeavoured  to  disperse  melancholy  by  some  of  the  old 
methods.  In  the  winter  of  1783-4  he  got  together  the 
few  surviving  members  of  the  old  Ivy  Lane  Club,  which 
had  flourished  when  he  was  composing  the  Dictionary  ; 
but  the  old  place  of  meeting  had  vanished,  most  of  the 
original  members  were  dead,  and  the  gathering  can  have 
been  but  melancholy.  He  started  another  club  at  the 
Essex  Head,  whose  members  were  to  meet  twice  a  week, 
with  the  modest  fine  of  threepence  for  non-attendance.  It 
appears  to  have  included  a  rather  "  strange  mixture  "  of 
people,  and  thereby  to  have  given  some  scandal  to  Sir 
John  Hawkins  and  even  to  Reynolds.  They  thought 
that  his  craving  for  society,  increased  by  his  loss  of 
Streatham,  was  leading  him  to  undignified  concessions. 

Amongst  the  members  of  the  club,  however,  were  such 
men  as  Horsley  and  Windham.  Windham  seems  to  have 
attracted  more  personal  regard  than  most  politicians,  by  a 
generous  warmth  of  enthusiasm  not  too  common  in  the 
class.  In  politics  -he  was  an  ardent  disciple  of  Burke's, 
whom  he  afterwards  followed  in  his  separation  from  the 
new  Whigs,  But,  though  adhering  to  the  principles  which 
Johnson  detested,  he  knew,  like  his  preceptor,  how  to 
win  Johnson's  warmest  regard.  He  was  the  most  eminent 
of  the  younger  generation  who  now  looked  up  to  Johnson 
as  a  venerable  relic  from  the  past.  Another  was  young 
Burke,  that  very  'priggish  and  silly  young  man  as  he 
seems  to  have  been,  whose  loss,  none  the  less,  broke  the 
tender  heart  of  his  father.  Friendships,  now  more  in- 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.      163 

toresting,  were  those  with  two  of  the  most  distinguished 
authoresses  of  the  day.  One  of  them  was  Hannah  More, 
who  was  about  this  time  coming  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  talents  which  had  gained  her  distinction  in  the  literary 
and  even  in  the  dramatic  world,  should  be  consecrated  to 
less  secular  employment.  Her  vivacity  during  the  earlier 
years  of  their  acquaintance  exposed  her  to  an  occasional 
rebuff.  "She  does  not  gain  upon  me,  sir ;  I  think  her 
empty-headed,"  was  one  of  his  remarks ;  and  it  was  to 
her  that  he  said,  according  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  though  Boswell 
reports  a  softened  version  of  the  remark,  that  she  should 
"  consider  what  her  flattery  was  worth,  before  she  choked 
him  with  it."  More  frequently,  he  seems  to  have  repaid 
it  in  kind.  "  There  was  no  name  in  poetry,"  he  said, 
"which  might  not  be  glad  to  own  her  poem" — the 
Bas  Bleu.  Certainly  Johnson  did  not  stick  at  trifles 
in  intercourse  with  his  female  friends.  He  was  delighted, 
shortly  before  his  death,  to  "  gallant  it  about "  with  her  at 
Oxford,  and  in  serious  moments  showed  a  respectful 
regard  for  her  merits.  Hannah  More,  who  thus  sat  at 
the  feet  of  Johnson,  encouraged  the  juvenile  ambition  of 
Macaulay,  and  did  not  die  till  the  historian  had  grown 
into  manhood  and  fame.  The  other  friendship  noticed 
was  with  Fanny  Burney,  who  also  lived  to  our  own 
time.  Johnson's  affection  for  this  daughter  of  his  friend 
seems  to  have  been  amongst  the  tenderest  of  his  old 
age.  When  she  was  first  introduced  to  him  at  the 
Thrales,  she  was  overpowered  and  indeed  had  her 
head  a  little  turned  by  flattery  of  the  most  agreeable 
kind  that  an  author  can  receive.  The  "great  literary 
Leviathan"  showed  himself  to  have  the  recently  pub- 
lished Evelina  at  his  fingers'  ends.  He  quoted,  and 
almost  acted  passages.  "  La  !  Polly  ! "  he  exclaimed  in  a 


164  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

pert  feminine  accent,  "  only  think  !  Miss  has  danced  with 
a  lord  !  "  How  many  modern  readers  can  assign  its  place 
to  that  quotation,  or  answer  the  question  which  poor 
Boswell  asked  in  despair  and  amidst  general  ridicule  for 
his  ignorance,  "  What  is  a  Brangton  ]  "  There  is  some- 
thing pleasant  in  the  enthusiasm  with  which  men  like 
Johnson  and  Burke  welcomed  the  literary  achievements 
of  the  young  lady,  whose  first  novels  seem  to  have  made 
a  sensation  almost  as  lively  as  that  produced  by  Miss 
Bronte,  and  far  superior  to  anything  that  fell  to  the  lot 
of  Miss  Austen.  Johnson  seems  also  to  have  regarded 
her  with  personal  affection.  He  had  a  tender  interview 
with  her  shortly  before  his  death ;  he  begged  her  with 
solemn  energy  to  remember  him  in  her  prayers ;  he 
apologized  pathetically  for  being  unable  to  see  her,  as 
his  weakness  increased  ;  and  sent  her  tender  messages 
from  his  deathbed. 

As  the  end  drew  near,  Johnson  accepted  the  inevitable 
like  a  man.  After  spending  most  of  the  latter  months  of 
1 784  in  the  country  with  the  friends  who,  after  the  loss  of 
the  Thrales,  could  give  him  most  domestic  comfort,  he  came 
back  to  London  to  die.  He  made  his  will,  and  settled  a 
few  matters  of  business,  and  was  pleased  to  be  told  that 
he  would  be  buried  in  Westminster  Abbey.  He  uttered 
a  few  words  of  solemn  advice  to  those  who  came  near 
him,  and  took  affecting  leave  of  his  friends.  Langton, 
so  warmly  loved,  was  in  close  attendance.  Johnson  said 
to  him  tenderly,  Te  teneam  moriens  deficiente  manu. 
Windham  broke  from  political  occupations  to  sit  by  the 
dying  man ;  once  Langton  found  Burke  sitting  by  his 
bedside  with  three  or  four  friends.  "  I  am  afraid,"  said 
Burke,  "  that  so  many  of  us  must  be  oppressive  to  you." 
"No,  sir,  it  is  not  so,"  replied  Johnson,  "and  I  must  bo 


v.]        THE  CLOSING  YEARS  OF  JOHNSON'S  LIFE.       165 

in  a  wretched  state  indeed  when  your  company  would 
not  "be  a  delight  to  me."  "  My  dear  sir,"  said  Burke, 
with  a  breaking  voice,  "  you  have  always  been  too  good 
to  me  ;"  and  parted  from  his  old  friend  for  the  last  time. 
Of  Reynolds,  he  begged  three  things  :  to  forgive  a  debt  of 
thirty  pounds,  to  read  the  Bible,  and  never  to  paint  on 
Sundays.  A  few  flashes  of  the  old  humour  broke  through. 
He  said  of  a  man  who  sat  up  with  him  :  "  Sir,  the 
fellow's  an  idiot ;  he's  as  awkward  as  a  turnspit  when 
first  put  into  the  wheel,  and  as  sleepy  as  a  dormouse," 
His  last  recorded  words  were  to  a  young  lady  who  had 
begged  for  his  blessing :  "God  bless  you,  my  dear." 
The  same  day,  December  13th,  1784,  he  gradually 
sank  and  died  peacefully.  He  was  laid  in  the  Abbey 
by  the  side  of  Goldsmith,  and  the  playful  prediction  has 
been  amply  fulfilled : — 

Forsitan  et  nostrum  nomen  miscebitur  istis. 

The  names  of  many  greater  writers  are  inscribed  upon 
the  walls  of  "Westminster  Abbey ;  but  scarcely  any  one 
lies  there  whose  heart  was  more  acutely  responsive  during 
life  to  the  deepest  and  tenderest  of  human  emotions. 
In  visiting  that  strange  gathering  of  departed  heroes  and 
statesmen  and  philanthropists  and  poets,  there  are  many 
whose  words  and  deeds  have  a  far  greater  influence  upon 
our  imaginations ;  but  there  are  very  few  whom,  when 
all  has  been  said,  we  can  love  so  heartily  as  Samuel 
Johnson, 


166  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS. 

IT  remains  to  speak  of  Johnson's  position  in  literature. 
For  reasons  sufficiently  obvious,  few  men  whose  lives 
have  been  devoted  to  letters  for  an  equal  period,  have  left 
behind  them  such  scanty  and  inadequate  remains.  John- 
son, as  we  have  seen,  worked  only  under  the  pressure  of 
circumstances ;  a  very  small  proportion  of  his  latter  life 
was  devoted  to  literary  employment.  The  working  hours 
of  his  earlier  years  were  spent  for  the  most  part  in  pro- 
ductions which,  can  hardly  be  called  literary.  Seven 
years  were  devoted  to  the  Dictionary,  which,  whatever  its 
merits,  could  be  a  book  only  in  the  material  sense  of  the 
word,  and  was  of  course  destined  to  be  soon  superseded. 
Much,  of  his  hack-work  has  doubtless  passed  into  oblivion, 
and  though  the  ordinary  relic-worship  has  gathered 
together  fragments  enough  to  fill  twelve  decent  octavo 
volumes  (to  which  may  be  added  the  two  volumes  of 
parliamentary  reports),  the  part  which  can  be  called  alive 
may  be  compressed  into  very  moderate  compass.  Johnson 
may  be  considered  as  a  poet,  an  essayist,  a  pamphleteer, 
a  traveller,  a  critic,  and  a  biographer.  Among  his 
poems,  the  two  imitations  of  Juvenal,  especially  the 
Vanity  of  Human  Wishes,  and  a  minor  fragment  or  two, 
probably  deserve  more  respect  than  would  bo  conceded 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  167 

to  them  by  adherents  of  modern  schools.  His  most 
ambitions  work,  Irene,  can  be  read  by  men  in  whom  a 
sense  of  duty  has  been  abnormally  developed.  Among 
the  two  hundred  and  odd  essays  of  the  Rambler,  there  is 
a  fair  proportion  which  will  deserve,  but  will  hardly 
obtain,  respectful  attention.  Rasselas,  one  of  the  philo- 
sophical tales  popular  in  the  last  century,  gives  the  essence 
of  much  of  the  Rambler  in  a  different  form,  and  to  these 
may  be  added  the  essay  upon  Soame  Jenyns,  which 
deals  with  the  same  absorbing  question  of  human  happi- 
ness. The  political  pamphlets,  and  the  Journey  to  the 
Hebrides,  have  a  certain  historical  interest;  but  'are 
otherwise  readable  only  in  particular  passages.  Much  cf 
his  criticism  is  pretty  nearly  obsolete;  but  the  child 
"of  his  old  age — the  Lives  of  the  Poets — a  book  in  which 
criticism  and  biography  are  combined,  is  an  admirable 
performance  in  spite  of  serious  defects.  It  is  the  work 
that  best  reflects  his  mind,  and  intelligent  readers  who 
have  once  made  its  acquaintance,  will  be  apt  to  turn  it 
into  a  familiar  companion. 

If  it  is  easy  to  assign  the  causes  which  limited  the 
quantity  of  Johnson's  work,  it  is  more  curious  to  inquire 
what  was  the  -quality  which  once  gained  for  it  so  much 
authority,  and  which  now  seems  to  have  so  far  lost  its 
savour.  The  peculiar  style  which  is  associated  with 
Johnson's  name  must  count  for  something  in  both 
processes.  The  mannerism  is  strongly  marked,  and  of 
course  offensive ;  for  by  "  mannerism,"  as  I  understand 
the  word,  is  meant  the  repetition  of  certain  forms  of 
language  in  obedience  to  blind  habit  and  without  re- 
ference to  their  propriety  in  the  particular  case.  John- 
son's sentences  seem  to  be  contorted,  as  his  gigantic 
limbs  used  to  twitch,  by  a  kind  of  mechanical  spasmodic 


1R8  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  LCHAP 

action.  The  most  obvious  peculiarity  is  the  tendency 
which  he  noticed  himself,  to  "  use  too  big  words  and  too 
many  of  them."  He  had  to  explain  to  Miss  Reynolds 
that  the  Shakesperian  line, — • 

Yon  must  borrow  me  Garagantua's  mouth, 

had  been  applied  to  him  because  he  used  "  big  words, 
which  require  the  mouth  of  a  giant  to  pronounce  them." 
It  was  not,  however,  the  mere  bigness  of  the  words 
that  distinguished  his  style,  but  a  peculiar  love  of 
putting  the  abstract  for  the  concrete,  of  using  awkward 
inversions,  and  of  balancing  his  sentences  in  a  monotonous 
rhythm,  which  gives  the  appearance,  as  it  sometimes 
corresponds  to  the  reality,  of  elaborate  logical  discrimina- 
tion. With  all  its  faults  the  style  has  the  merits  of 
masculine  directness.  The  inversions  are  not  such  as  to 
complicate  the  construction.  As  Boswell  remarks,  he 
never  uses  a  parenthesis ;  and  his  style,  though  ponder- 
ous and  wearisome,  is  as  transparent  as  the  smarter  snip- 
snap  of  Macau!  ;iy. 

This  singular  mannerism  appears  in  his  earliest 
writings ;  it  is  most  marked  at  the  time  of  the  Rambler  ; 
whilst  in  the  Lives  of  the  Poets,  although  I  think  that 
the  trick  of  inversion  has  become  commoner,  the  other 
peculiarities  have  been  so  far  softened  as  (in  my  judgment, 
at  least),  to  be  inoffensive.  It  is  perhaps  needless  to 
give  examples  of  a  tendency  which  marks  almost  every 
page  of  his  writing.  A  passage  or  two  from  the  Rambler 
may  illustrate  the  quality  of  the  style,  and  the  oddity  of 
the  effect  produced,  when  it  is  applied  to  topics  of  a 
trivial  kind.  The  author  of  the  Rambler  is  supposed  to 
receive  a  remonstrance  upon  his  excessive  gravity  from 
the  lively  Flirtilla,  who  wishes  him  to  write  in  defence  of 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  169 

masquerades.  Conscious  of  his  own  incapacity,  he 
applies  to  a  man  of  "  high  reputation  in  gay  life  •"  who, 
on  the  fifth  perusal  of  Flirtilla's  letter  breaks  into  a 
rapture,  and  declares  that  he  is  ready  to  devote  himself  to 
her  service.  Here  is  part  of  the  apostrophe  put  into  the 
mouth  of  this  brilliant  rake.  "  Behold,  Flirtilla,  at  thy 
feet  a  man  grown  gray  in  the  study  of  those  noble  arts 
by  which  right  and  wrong  may  be  confounded ;  by 
which  reason  may  be  blinded,  when  we  have  a  mind  to 
escape  from  her  inspection,  and  caprice  and  appetite 
instated  in  uncontrolled-  command  and  boundless 
dominion !  Such  a  casuist  may  surely  engage  with 
certainty  of  success  in  vindication  of  an  entertainment 
which  in  an  instant  gives  confidence  to  the  timorous  and 
kindles  ardour  in  the  cold,  an  entertainment  where  the 
vigilance  of  jealousy  has  so  often  been  clouded,  and  the 
virgin  is  set  free  from  the  necessity  of  languishing  in 
silence ;  where  all  the  outworks  of  chastity  are  at  once 
demolished;  where  the  heart  is  laid  open  without  a 
blush ;  where  bashfulness  may  survive  virtue,  and  no 
wish  is  crushed  under  the  frown  of  modesty." 

Here  is  another  passage,  in  which  Johnson  is  speaking 
upon  a  topic  more  within  his  proper  province ;  and  which 
contains  sound  sense  under  its  weight  of  words.  A 
man,  he  says,  who  reads  a  printed  book,  is  often  con- 
tented to  be  pleased  without  critical  examination.  "  But," 
he  adds,  "  if  the  same  man  be  called  to  consider  the 
merit  of  a  production  yet  unpublished,  he  brings  an 
imagination  heated  with  objections  to  passages  which  he 
has  never  yet  heard;  he  invokes  all  the  powers  of 
criticism,  and  stores  his  memory  with  Taste  and  Grace, 
Purity  and  .Delicacy,  Manners  and  Unities,  sounds  which 
having  been  .once  uttered  by  those  that  understood 
8* 


170  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

them,  have  been  since  re-echoed  without  meaning,  and 
kept  up  to  the  disturbance  of  the  world  by  constant 
repercussion  from  one  coxcomb  to  another.  He  con- 
siders himself  as  obliged  to  show  by  some  proof  of  his 
abilities,  that  he  is  not  consulted  to  no  purpose,  and 
therefore  watches  every  opening  for  objection,  and  looks 
round  for  every  opportunity  to  propose  some  specious 
alteration.  Such  opportunities  a  very  small  degree  of 
sagacity  will  enable  him  to  find,  for  in  every  work  of 
imagination,  the  disposition  of  parts,  the  insertion  of 
incidents,  and  use  of  decorations  may  bo  varied  in  a 
thousand  ways  with  equal  propriety ;  and,  as  in  things 
nearly  equal  that  will  always  seem  best  to  every  man 
which  he  himself  produces,  the  critic,  whose  business 
is  only  to  propose  without  the  care  of  execution,  can 
never  want  the  satisfaction  of  believing  that  he  has 
suggested  very  important  improvements,  nor  the  power 
of  enforcing  his  advice  by  arguments,  which,  as  they 
appear  convincing  to  himself,  either  his  kindness  or  his 
vanity  will  press  obstinately  and  importunately,  without 
suspicion  that  he  may  possibly  judge  too  hastily  in  favour 
of  his  own  advice  or  inquiry  whether  the  advantage  of 
the  new  scheme  be  proportionate  to  the  labour."  "We  may 
still  notice  a  "  repercussion  "  of  words  from  one  coxcomb 
to  another ;  though  somehow  the  words  have  been 
changed  or  translated. 

Johnson's  style  is  characteristic  of  the  individual  and 
of  the  epoch.  The  preceding  generation  had  exhibited 
the  final  triumph  of  common  sense  over  the  pedantry  of  a 
decaying  scholasticism.  The  movements  represented  by 
Locke's  philosophy,  by  the  rationalizing  school  in  theology, 
and  by  the  so-called  classicism  of  Pope  and  his  followers, 
are  different  phases  of  the  same  impulse.  The  quality 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  171 

valued  above  all  others  in  philosophy,  literature,  and  art 
was  clear,  bright,  common  sense.  To  expel  the  mystery 
•which  had  served  as  a  cloak  for  charlatans  was  the  great 
aim  of  the  time,  and  the  method  was  to  appeal  from  the 
professors  of  exploded  technicalities  to  the  judgment  of 
cultivated  men  of  the  world.  Berkeley  places  his  Utopia 
in  happy  climes,  — 

Where  nature  guides,  and  virtue  rules, 
Where  men  shall  not  impose  for  truth  and  sense 
The  pedantry  of  covets  and  schools. 

Simplicity,  clearness,  directness  are,  therefore,  the  great 
virtues  of  thought  and  style.  Berkeley,  Addison,  Pope, 
and  Swift  are  the  great  models  of  such  excellence  in 
various  departments  of  literature. 

In  the  succeeding  generation  we  "become  aware  of  a 
certain  leaven  of  dissatisfaction  with  the  aesthetic  and 
intellectual  code  thus  inherited.  The  supremacy  of  com- 
mon sense,  the  superlative  importance  of  clearness,  is  still 
fully  acknowledged,  but  there  is  a  growing  undertone  of 
dissent  in  form  and  substance.  Attempts  are  made  to  re- 
store philosophical  conceptions  assailed  by  Locke  and  his 
followers ;  the  rationalism  of  the  deistic  or  semi-deistic 
writers  is  declared  to  be  superficial;  their  optimistic  theories 
disregard  the  dark  side  of  nature,  and  provide  no  sufficient 
utterance  for  the  sadness  caused  by  the  contemplation  of 
human  suffering ;  and  the  polished  monotony  of  Pope's 
verses  begins  to  pall  upon  those  who  shall  tread  in  his 
steps.  Some  daring  sceptics  are  even  inquiring  whether 
he  is  a  poet  at  all.  And  simultaneously,  though  Addison 
is  still  a  kind  of  sacred  model,  the  best  prose  writers  are 
beginning  to  aim  at  a  more  complex  structure  of  sentence, 
fitted  for  the  expression  of  a  wider  range  of  thought  and. 
emotion. 


172  .     SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP 

Johnson,  though  no  conscious  revolutionist,  shares  this 
growing  discontent.  The  Spectator  is  written  in  the  lan- 
guage of  the  drawing-room  and  the  coffee-house.  Nothing 
is  ever  said  which  might  not  pass  in  conversation  between 
a  couple  of  "  wits,"  with,  at  most,  some  graceful  indulgence 
in  passing  moods  of  solemn  or  tender  sentiment.  Johnson, 
though  devoted  to  society  in  his  own  way,  was  anything 
but  a  producer  of  small  talk.  Society  meant  to  him  an 
escape  from  the  gloom  which  beset  him  whenever  he  was 
abandoned  to  his  thoughts.  Neither  his  education  nor 
the  manners  acquired  in  Grub  Street  had  qualified  him  to 
be  an  observer  of 'those  lighter  foibles  which  were  touched 
by  Addison  with  so  dexterous  a  hand.  When  he  ven- 
tures upon  such  topics  he  flounders  dreadfully,  and  rather 
reminds  us  of  an  artist  who  should  attempt  to  paint 
miniatures  with  a  mop.  No  man,  indeed,  took  more  of 
interest  in  what  is  called  the  science  of  human  nature ; 
and,  when  roused  by  the  stimulus  of  argument,  he  could 
talk,  as  has  been  shown,  with  almost  unrivalled  vigour 
and  point.  Eut  his  favourite  topics  are  the  deeper  springs 
of  character,  rather  than  superficial  peculiarities ;  and  his 
vigorous  sayings  are  concentrated  essence  of  strong  sense 
and  deep  feeling,  not  dainty  epigrams  or  graceful  embodi- 
ments of  delicate  observation.  Johnson  was  not,  like 
some  contemporary  antiquarians,  a  systematic  student  of  the 
English  literature  of  the  preceding  centuries,  but  he  had 
a  strong  affection  for  some  of  its  chief  masterpieces.  Bur- 
ton's Anatomy  of  Melancholy  was,  he  declared,  the  only 
book  which  ever  got  him  out  of  bed  two  hours  sooner 
than  he  wished.  Sir  Thomas  BrownC  was  another  con- 
genial writer,  who  is  supposed  to  have  had  some  influence 
upon  his  style.  He  never  seems  to  have  directly  imitated 
any  one,  though  some  nonsense  has  been  talked  about  his 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  173 

"forming  a  style;"  but  it  is  probable  that  he  felt  a  closer 
affinity  to  those  old  scholars,  with  their  elaborate  and 
ornate  language  and  their  deep  and  solemn  tone  of  senti- 
ment, than  to  the  brilliant  but  comparatively  superficial 
writers  of  Queen  Anne's  time.  He  was,  one  'may  say,  a 
scholar  of  the  old  type,  forced  by  circumstances  upon  the 
world,  but  always  retaining  a  sympathy  for  the  scholar's 
life  and  temper.  Accordingly,  his  style  acquired  some- 
thing of  the  old  elaboration,  though  the  attempt  to  con- 
form to  the  canons  of  a  later  age  renders  the  structure  dis- 
agreeably monotonous.  His  tendency  to  pomposity  is  not 
redeemed  by  the  naivete  and  spontaneity  of  his  masters. 

The  inferiority  of  Johnson's  written  to  his  spoken 
utterances  is  indicative  of  his  divided  life.  There  are 
moments  at  which  his  writing  takes  the  terse,  vigorous 
tone  of  his  talk.  In  his  letters,  such  as  those  to  Chester- 
field and  Macpherson  and  in  occasional  passages  of  his 
pamphlets,  we  see  that  he  could  be  pithy  enough  when  he 
chose  to  descend  from  his  Latinized  abstractions  to  good 
concrete  English ;  but  that  is  only  when  he  becomes  ex- 
cited. His  face  when  in  repose,  we  are  told,  appeared  to 
be  almost  imbecile ;  he  was  constantly  sunk  in  reveries, 
from  which  he  was  only  roused  by  a  challenge  to  conver- 
sation. In  his  writings,  for  the  most  part,  we  seem  to  be 
listening  to  the  reverie  rather  than  the  talk ;  we  are  over- 
hearing a  soliloquy  in  his  study,  not  a  vigorous  discussion 
over  the  twentieth  cup  of  tea ;  he  is  not  fairly  put  upon 
his  mettle,  and  is  content  to  expound  without  enforcing. 
"We  seem  to  see  a  man,  heavy-eyed,  ponderous  in  his 
gestures,  like  some  huge  mechanism  which  grinds  out  a 
ponderous  tissue  of  verbiage  as  heavy  as  it  is  certainly 
solid. 

ThQ  substance  corresponds  to  the  style.    Johnson  has 


174  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP! 

something  in  common  with  the  fashionable  pessimism  of 
modern  times.  No  sentimentalist  of  to-day  could  be  more 
convinced  that  life  is  in  the  main  miserable.  It  was  his 
favourite  theory,  according  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  that  all  human 
action  was  prompted  by  the  "  vacuity  of  life."  Men  act 
solely  in  the  hope  of  escaping  from  themselves.  Evil,  as 
a  follower  of  Schopenhauer  would  assert,  is  the  positive, 
and  good  merely  the  negative  of  evil.  All  desire  is  at 
bottom  an  attempt  to  escape  from  pain.  The  doctrine 
neither  resulted  from,  nor  generated,  a  philosophical  theory 
in  Johnson's  case,  and  was  in  the  main  a  generaliza- 
tion of  his  own  experience.  Not  the  less,  the  aim  of 
most  of  his  writing  is  to  express  this  sentiment  in  one 
form  or  other.  He  differs,  indeed,  from,  most  modern 
sentimentalists,  in  having  the  most  hearty  contempt  for 
useless  whining.  If  he  dwells  upon  human  misery,  it  is 
because  he  feels  that  it  is  as  futile  to  join  with  the  opti- 
mist in  ignoring,  as  with  the  pessimist  in  howling  over 
the  evil.  "VVe  are  in  a  sad  world,  full  of  pain,  but 
wo  have  to  make  the  best  of  it.  Stubborn  patience  and 
hard  work  are  the  sole  remedies,  or  rather  the  sole 
means  of  temporary  escape.  Much  of  the  Rambler  is 
occupied  with  variations  upon  this  theme,  and  expresses 
the  kind  of  dogged  resolution  with  which  he  would  have 
us  plod  through  this  weary  world.  Take  for  example 
this  passage : — "  The  controversy  about  the  reality  of 
external  evils  is  now  at  an  end.  That  life  has  many 
miseries,  and  that  those  miseries  are  sometimes  at  least 
equal  to  all  the  powers  of  fortitude  is  now  universally 
confessed ;  and,  therefore,  it  is  useful  to  consider  not  only 
how  we  may  escape  them,  but  by  what  means  those 
which  either  the  accidents  of  affairs  or  the  infirmities 
of  nature  must  bring  upon  us  may  be  mitigated  and 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WEITINGS.  175 

lightened,  and  how  we  may  make  those  hours  less  wretched 
which  the  condition  of  our  present  existence  will  not 
allow  to  be  very  happy. 

"  The  cure  for  the  greatest  part  of  human  miseries  is  not 
radical,  but  palliative.  Infelicity  is  involved  in  corporeal 
nature,  and  interwoven  with  our  being;  all  attempts, 
therefore,  to  decline  'it  wholly  are  useless  and  vain ;  the 
armies  of  pain  send  their  arrows  against  us  on  every  side, 
the  choice  is  only  between  those  which  are  more  or  less 
sharp,  or  tinged  with  poison  of  greater  or  less  malignity  ; 
and  the  strongest  armour  which  reason  can  supply  will 
only  blunt  their  points,  but  cannot  repel  them. 

"The  great  remedy  which  Heaven  has  put  in  our  hands 
is  patience,  by  which,  though  we  cannot  lessen  the  tor- 
ments of  the  body,  we  can  in  a  great  measure  preserve 
the  peace  of  the  mind,  and  shall  suffer  only  the  natural 
and  genuine  force  of  an  evil,  without  heightening  its 
acrimony  or  prolonging  its  effects." 

It  is  hardly  desirable  for  a  moralist  to  aim  at  originality 
in  his  precepts.  We  must  be  content  if  he  enforces  old 
truths  in  such  a  manner  as  to  convince  us  of  the  depth 
and  sincerity  of  his  feeling.  Johnson,  it  must  be  con- 
fessed, rather  abuses  the  moralist's  privilege  of  being 
commonplace.  He  descants  not  un frequently  upon  pro- 
positions so  trite  that  even  the  most  earnest  enforcement 
can  give  them  little  interest.  With  all  drawbacks,  how- 
ever, the  moralizing  is  the  best  part  of  the  Rambler. 
Many  of  the  papers  follow  the  precedent  set  by  Addison 
in  the  Spectator,  but  without  Addison's  felicity.  Like 
Addison,  he  indulges  in  allegory,  which,  in  his  hands, 
becomes  unendurably  frigid  and  clumsy ;  ho  tries  light 
social  satire,  and  is  fain  to  confess  that  we  can  spy  a 
beard  under  the  muffler  of  his  feminine  characters ;  he 


176  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CIIAP. 

treats  us  to  criticism  which,,  like  Addison's,  goes  upon 
exploded  principles,  but  unlike  Addison's,  is  apt  to  be 
almost  wilfully  outrageous.  His  odd  remarks  upon 
Milton's  versification  are  the  worst  example  of  this  weak- 
ness. The  result  is  what  one  might  expect  from  the 
attempt  of  a  writer  without  an  ear  to  sit  in  judgment 
upon  the  greatest  master  of  harrnony*in  the  language. 

These  defects  have  consigned  the  Rambler  to  the 
dustiest  shelves  of  libraries,  and  account  for  the  wonder 
expressed  by  such  a  critic  as  M.  Taine  at  the  English 
love  of  Johnson.  Certainly  if  that  love  were  nourished, 
as  he  seems  to  fancy,  by  assiduous  study  of  the  Rambler, 
it  would  be  a  curious  phenomenon.  And  yet  with  all 
its  faults,  the  reader  who  can  plod  through  its  pages 
will  at  least  feel  respect  for  the  author.  It  is  not 
unworthy  of  the  man  whose  great  lesson  is  "  clear  your 
mind  of  cant ;"  1  who  felt  most  deeply  the  misery  of  the 
world,  but  from  the  bottom  of  his  heart  despised 
querulous  and  sentimental  complaints  on  one  side,  and 
optimist  glasses  upon  the  other.  To  him,  as  to  some  others 
of  his  temperament,  the  affectation  of  looking  at  the 
bright  side  of  things  seems  to  have  presented  itself  as  the 
bitterest  of  mockeries;  and  nothing  would  tempt  him 
to  let  fine  words  pass  themselves  off  for  genuine  sense. 
Here  are  some  remarks  upon  the  vanity  in  which  some 
authors  seek  for  consolation,  which  may  illustrate  this 

1  Of  this  well-known  sentiment  it  may  be  said,  as  of  some  other 
familiar  quotations,  that  its  direct  meaning  has  been  slightly 
modified  in  use.  The  emphasis  is  changed.  Johnson's  words 
were  "  Clear  your  mind  of  cant.  You  may  talk  as  other  people  do  j 
you  may  say  to  a  man,  sir,  I  am  your  humble  servant ;  you  are  not 
his  most  humble  servant.  .  .  .  You  may  talk  in  this  manner ; 
it  is  a  mode  of  talking  in  society ;  but  don't  think  foolishly." 


.vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WETTINGS.  177 

love  of  realities  and   conclude  our  quotations  from  the 
Rambler. 

"  By  such  acts  of  voluntary  delusion  does  every  man 
endeavour  to  conceal  his  own  unimportance  from  himself. 
It  is  long  before  we  are  convinced  of  the  small  propor- 
tion which  every  individual  bears  to  the  collective  body 
of  mankind ;  or  learn  how  few  can  be  interested  in  the 
fortune  of  any  single  man  ;  how  little  vacancy  is  left  in 
the  world  for  any  new  object  of  attention ;  to  how  small 
extent  the  brightest  blaze  of  merit  can  be  spread  amidst 
the  mists  of  business  and  of  folly ;  and  how  soon  it  is 
clouded  by  the  intervention  of  other  novelties.  Not 
only  the  writer  of  books,  but  the  commander  of  armies, 
and  the  deliverer  of  nations,  will  easily  outlive  all  noisy 
and  popular  reputation  :  he  may  be  celebrated  for  a  time 
by  the  public  voice,  but  his  actions  and  his  name  will 
soon  be  considered  as  remote  and  unaffecting,  and  be  rarely 
mentioned  but  by  those  whose  alliance  gives  them  some 
vanity  to  gratify  by  frequent  commemoration.  It  seems 
not  to  be  sufficiently  considered  how  little  renown  can 
be  admitted  in  the  world.  Mankind  are  kept  perpetually 
busy  by  their  fears  or  desires,  and  have  not  more 
leisure  from  their  own  affairs  than  to  acquaint  them- 
selves with  the  accidents  of  the  current  day.  Engaged  in 
contriving  some  refuge  from  calamity,  or  in  shortening 
their  way  to  some  new  possession,  they  seldom  suffer  their 
thoughts  to  wander  to  the  past  or  future ;  none  but  a  few 
solitary  students  have  leisure  to  inquire  into  the  claims 
of  ancient  heroes  or  sages ;  and  names  which  hoped  to 
range  over  kingdoms  and  continents  shrink  at  last  into 
cloisters  and  colleges.  NOT  is  it  certain  that  even  of 
these  dark  and  narrow  habitations,  these  last  retreats  of 
fame,  the  possession  will  bo  long,  kept  Of  men  devoted 


178  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

to  literature  very  few  extend  their  views  beyond  some 
particular  science,  and  the  greater  part  seldom  inquire,  even 
in  their  own  profession,  for  any  authors  but  those  whom 
the  present  mode  of  study  happens  to  force  upon  their 
notice ;  they  desire  not  to  fill  their  minds  with  un- 
fashionable knowledge,  but  contentedly  resign  to  oblivion 
those  books  which  they  now  find  censured  or  neglected." 

The  most  remarkable  of  Johnson's  utterances  upon 
his  favourite  topic  of  the  Vanity  of  Human  "Wishes  is 
the  story  of  Rasselas.  The  plan  of  the  book  is  simple, 
and  recalls  certain  parts  of  Voltaire's  simultaneous  but 
incomparably  more  brilliant  attack  upon  Optimism  in 
Candide.  There  is  supposed  to  be  a  happy  valley  in 
Abyssinia  where  the  royal  princes  are  confined  in  total 
seclusion,  but  with  ample  supplies  for  every  conceivable 
want.  Basselas,  who  has  been  thus  educated,  becomes 
curious  as  to  the  outside  world,  and  at  last  makes  his 
escape  with  his  sister,  her  attendant,  and  the  ancient 
sage  and  poet,  Imlac.  Under  Imlac's  guidance  they 
survey  life  and  manners  in  various  stations;  they  make 
the  acquaintance  of  philosophers,  statesmen,  men  of  the 
world,  and  recluses;  they  discuss  the  results  of  their 
experience  pretty  much  in  the  style  of  the  Rambler ; 
they  agree  to  pronounce  the  sentence  "Vanity  of 
Vanities  ! "  and  finally,  in  a  "  conclusion  where  nothing  is 
concluded,"  they  resolve  to  return  to  the  happy  valley. 
The  book  is  little  more  than  a  set  of  essays  upon  life, 
with  just  story  enough  to  hold  it  together.  It  is  want- 
ing in  those  brilliant  flashes  of  epigram,  which  illustrate 
Voltaire's  pages  so  as  to.  blind  some  readers  to  its  real 
force  of  sentiment,  and  yet  it  leaves  a  peculiar  and 
powerful  impression  upon  the  reader. 

The  geneial  tone  may  be  collected  irom  a  few  passages. 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  179 

Here  is  a  fragment,  the  conclusion  of  which  is  perhaps 
the  most  familiar  of  quotations  from  Johnson's  writings. 
Imlac  in  narrating  his  life  describes  his  attempts  to 
become  a  poet. 

"  The  business  of  a  poet,"  said  Imlac,  "  is  to  examine 
not  the  individual,  but  the  species;  to  remark  general 
properties  and  large  appearances ;  he  does  not  number 
the  streaks  of  the  tulip  or  describe  the  different  shades  in 
the  verdure  of  the  forest.  He  is  to  exhibit  in  his 
portraits  of  nature  such  prominent  and  striking  features 
as  recall  the  original  to  every  mind ;  and  must  neglect 
the  minute  discriminations  which  one  may  have  remarked, 
and  another  have  neglected  for  those  characteristics  which 
are  alike  obvious  to  vigilance  and  carelessness." 

"  But  the  knowledge  of  nature  is  only  half  the  task  of 
a  poet ;  he  must  be  acquainted  likewise  with  all  the 
modes  of  life.  His  character  requires  that  he  estimate 
the  happiness  and  misery  of  every  condition  ;  observe  the 
power  of  all  the  passions  in  all  their  combinations,  and 
know  the  changes  of  the  human  mind  as  they  are  modified 
by  various  institutions,  and  accidental  influences  of 
climate  or  custom,  from  the  sprightliness  of  infancy  to 
the  despondency  of  decrepitude.  He  must  divest  him- 
self of  the  prejudices  of  his  age  or  country ;  he  must 
consider  right  and  wrong  in  their  abstracted  and  in- 
variable state ;  he  must  disregard  present  laws  and 
opinions,  and  rise  to  general  and  transcendental  truths, 
which  will  always  be  the  same  ;  he  must  therefore  content 
himseli  with  the  slow  progress  of  his  name ;  contemn  the 
applause  of  his  own  time,  and  commit  his  claims  to  the 
justice  of  posterity.  He  must  write  as  the  interpreter 
of  nature  and  the  legislator  of  mankind,  and  consider 
himself  as  presiding  over  the  thoughts  and  manners 


180  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

of  future  generations,  as  a  being  superior  to  time  and 
place. 

"  His  labours  are  not  yet  at  an  end ;  he  must  know 
many  languages  and  many  sciences;  and  that  his  stylo 
may  be  worthy  of  his  thoughts,  must  by  incessant 
practice  familiarize  to  himself  every  delicacy  of  speech 
and  grace  of  harmony." 

Imlac  now  felt  the  enthusiastic  fit  and  was  proceeding 
to  aggrandize  his  profession,  when  the  prince  cried  out, 
"  Enough,  thou  hast  convinced  me  that  no  human  being 
can  ever  be  a  poet." 

Indeed,  Johnson's  conception  of  poetry  is  not  the 
one  which  is  now  fashionable,  and  which  would  rather 
seem  to  imply  that  philosophical  power  and  moral  sensi- 
bility are  so  far  disqualifications  to  the  true  poet. 

Here,  again,  is  a  view  of  the  superfine  system  of  moral 
philosophy.  A  meeting  of  learned  men  is  discussing  the 
ever-recurring  problem  of  happiness,  and  one  of  them 
speaks  as  follows  : — 

"  The  way  to  be  happy  is  to  live  according  to  nature, 
in  obedience  to  that  universal  and  unalterable  law  with 
which  every  heart  is  originally  impressed ;  which  is  not 
written  on  it  by  precept,  but  engraven  by  destiny,  not 
instilled  by  education,  but  infused  at  our  nativity.  He 
that  lives  according  to  nature  will  suffer  nothing  from  the 
delusions  of  hope,  or  importunities  of  desire ;  he  will 
receive  and  reject  with  equability  of  temper,  and  act  or 
suffer  as  the  reason  of  things  shall  alternately  prescribe. 
Other  men  may  amuse  themselves  with  subtle  definitions 
or  intricate  ratiocinations.  Let  him  learn  to  be  wise  by 
easier  means  :  let  him  observe  the  hind  of  the  forest,  and 
the  linnet  of  the  grove;  let  him  consider  the  life  of 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WHITINGS.  181 

animals  whose  motions  are  regulated  by  instinct ;  they 
obey  their  guide  and  are  happy. 

"  Let  us,  therefore,  at  length  cease  to  dispute,  and  learn 
to  live ;  throw  away  the  incumbrance  of  precepts,  which 
they  who  utter  them  with  so  much  pride  and  pomp  do 
not  understand,  and  carry  with  us  this  simple  and  in- 
telligible maxim,  that  deviation  from  nature  is  deviation 
from  happiness." 

The  prince  modestly  inquires  what  is  the  precise 
meaning  of  the  advice  just  given. 

"  When  I  find  young  men  so  humble  and  so  docile," 
said  the  philosopher,  "  I  can  deny  them  no  information 
which  my  studies  have  enabled  me  to  aiford.  To  live 
according  to  nature,  is  to  act  always  with  due  regard  to 
the  fitness  arising  from  the  relations  and  qualities  of 
causes  and  effects,  to  concur  with  the  great  and  unchange- 
able scheme  of  universal  felicity ;  to  co-operate  with  the 
general  disposition  and  tendency  of  the  present  system  of 
things. 

"  The  prince  soon  found  that  this  was  one  of  the  sages, 
whom  he  should  understand  less  as  he  heard  him  longer." 

Here,  finally,  is  a  characteristic  reflection  upon  the  right 
mode  of  meeting  sorrow. 

"  The  state  of  a  mind  oppressed  with  a  sudden 
calamity,"  said  Imlac,  "is  like  that  of  the  fabulous 
inhabitants  of  the  new  created  earth,  who,  when  the  first 
night  came  upon  them,  supposed  that  day  would  never 
return.  When  the  clouds  of  sorrow  gather  over  us,  we 
see  nothing  beyond  them,  nor  can  imagine  how  they  will 
be  dispelled ;  yet  a  new  day  succeeded  to  the  night,  and 
sorrow  is  never  long  without  a  dawn  of  ease.  Bnt 
thev  who  restrain  themselves  from  receiving  comfort,  do 


182  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

as  the  savages  "Would  have  done,  had  they  put  out  their 
eyes  when  it  was  dark.  Our  minds,  like  our  bodies,  are 
in  continual  flux ;  something  is  hourly  lost,  and  some- 
thing acquired.  To  lose  much  at  once  is  inconvenient  to 
either,  but  while  the  vital  powers  remain  uninjured, 
nature  will  find  the  means  of  reparation. 

"  Distance  has  the  same  effect  on  the  mind  as  on  the 
eye,  and  while  we  glide  along  the  stream  of  time,  what- 
ever we  leave  behind  us  is  always  lessening,  and  that 
which  we  approach  increasing  in  magnitude.  Do  not 
suffer  life  to  stagnate ;  it  will  grow  muddy  for  want  of 
motion ;  commit  yourself  again  to  the  current  of  the 
world ;  Pekuah  will  vanish  by  degrees  ;  you  will  meet  in 
your  way  some  other  favourite,  or  learn  to  diffuse  your- 
self in  general  conversation." 

In  one  respect  Jtasse^as  is  curiously  contrasted  with 
Candide.  Voltaire's  story  is  aimed  at  the  doctrine  of 
theological  optimism,  and,  whether  that  doctrine  be  well 
or  ill  understood,  has  therefore  an  openly  sceptical  ten- 
dency. Johnson,  to  whom  nothing  could  be  more  abhor- 
rent than  an  alliance  with  any  assailant  of  orthodoxy, 
draws  no  inference  from  his  pessimism.  He  is  content  to 
state  the  fact  of  human  misery  without  perplexing  him- 
self with  the  resulting  problem  as  to  the  final  cause  of 
human  existence.  If  the  question  had  been  explicitly 
brought  before  him,  he  would,  doubtless,  have  replied 
that  the  mystery  was  insoluble.  To  answer  either  in  the 
sceptical  or  the  optimistic  sense  was  equally  presumptuous. 
Johnson's  religious  beliefs  in  fact  were  not  such  as  to  sug- 
gest that  kind  of  comfort  which  is  to  be  obtained  by  explain- 
ing away  the  existence  of  evil.  If  he,  too,  would  have 
said  that  in  some  sense  all  must  be  for  the  best  in  a  world 
ruled  by  a  perfect  Creator,  the  sense  must  be  one  which 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  183 

would  allow  of  the  eternal  misery  of  indefinite  multitudes 
of  his  creatures. 

But,  in  truth,  it  was  characteristic  of  Johnson  to  turn 
away  his  mind  from  such  topics.  He  was  interested  in 
ethical  speculations,  "but  on  the  practical  side,  in  the 
application  to  life,  not  in  the  philosophy  on  which  it 
might  be  grounded.  In  that  direction  he  could  see 
nothing  but  a  "milking  of  the  bull" — a  fruitless  or 
rather  a  pernicious  waste  of  intellect.  An  intense  convic- 
tion of  the  supreme  importance  of  a  moral  guidance  in 
this  difficult  world,  made  him  abhor  any  rash  inquiries  by 
which  the  basis  of  existing  authority  might  be  endangered. 

This  sentiment  is  involved  in  many  of  those  prejudices 
which  have  been  so  much,  and  in  some  sense  justifiably 
ridiculed.  Man  has  been  wretched  and  foolish  since  the 
race  began,  and  will  be  till  it  ends ;  one  chorus  of  lamen- 
tation has  ever  been  rising,  in  countless  dialects  but  with 
a  single  meaning ;  the  plausible  schemes  of  philosophers 
give  no  solution  to  the  everlasting  riddle ;  the  nostrums 
of  politicians  touch  only  the  surface  of  the  deeply-rooted 
evil ;  it  is  folly  to  be  querulous,  and  as  silly  to  fancy  that 
men  are  growing  worse,  as  that  they  are  much  better  than 
they  used  to  be.  The  evils  under  which  we  suffer  are 
not  skin-deep,  to  be  eradicated  by  changing  the  old  phy- 
sicians for  new  quacks.  "What  is  to  be  done  under  such 
conditions,  but  to  hold  fast  as  vigorously  as  we  can  to  the 
rules  of  life  and  faith  which  have  served  our  ancestors, 
and  which,  whatever  their  justifications,  are  at  least  the 
only  consolation,  because  they  supply  the  only  guidance 
through  this  labyrinth  of  troubles  ?  Macaulay  has  ridi- 
culed Johnson  for  what  he  takes  to  be  the  ludicrous  in- 
consistency of  his  intense  political  prejudice,  combined 
with  his  assertion  of  the  indifference  of  all  forms  of 


184  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

government.  "  If,"  says  Macaulay,  "  the  difference  be- 
tween, two  forms  of  government  bo  not  worth  half  a 
guinea,  it  is  not  easy  to  see  how  Whiggism.  can  be  viler 
than  Toryism,  or  the  Crown  can  have  too  little  power." 
The  answer  is  surely  obvious.  Whiggism  is  vile, 
according  to  the  doctor's  phrase,  because  Whiggism  is  a 
"negation  of  all  principle;"  it  is  in  his  view,  not  so 
much  the  preference  of  one  form  to  another,  as  an  attack 
upon  the  vital  condition  of  all  government.  He  called 
Burke  a  "bottomless  Whig"  in  this  sense,  implying  that 
Whiggism  meant  anarchy ;  and  in  the  next  generation 
a  good  many  people  were  led,  rightly  or  wrongly,  to  agree 
with  him  by  the  experience  of  the  French  revolution. 

This  dogged  conservatism  has  both  its  value  and  its 
grotesque  side.  When  Johnson  came  to  write  political 
pamphlets  in  his  later  years,  and  to  deal  with  subjects 
little  familiar  to  his  mind,  the  results  were  grotesque 
enough.  Loving  authority,  and  holding  one  authority  to 
be  as  good  as  another,  he  defended  with  uncompromising 
zeal  the  most  preposterous  and  tyrannical  measures. 
The  pamphlets  against  the  Wilkite  agitators  and  the 
American  rebels  are  little  more  than  a  huge  "  rhinoceros" 
snort  of  contempt  against  all  who  are  fools  enough  or 
wicked  enough  to  promote  war  and  disturbance  in  order  to 
change  one  form  of  authority  for  another.  Here  is  a 
characteristic  passage,  giving  his  view  of  the  value  of 
such  demonstrators : — 

"  The  progress  of  a  petition  is  well  known.  An  ejected 
placeman  goes  down  to  his  county  or  his  borough,  tells 
his  friends  of  his  inability  to  serve  them  and  his  consti- 
tuents, of  the  corruption  of  the  government.  His  friends 
readily  understand  that  he  who  can  get  nothing,  will  have 
nothing  to  give.  They  agree  to  proclaim  a  meeting. 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WHITINGS.  185 

Meat  and  drink  aro  plentifully  provided,  a  crowd  is  easily 
brought  together,  and  those  who  think  that  they  know 
the  reason  of  the  meeting  undertake  to  tell  those  who 
know  it  not.  Ale  and  clamour  unite  their  powers ;  the 
crowd,  condensed  and  heated,  begins  to  ferment  with  the 
leaven  of  sedition.  All  see  a  thousand  evils,  though  they 
cannot  show  them,  and  grow  impatient  for  a  remedy, 
though  they  know  not  what. 

"  A  speech  is  then  made  "by  the  Cicero  of  the  day ;  ho 
says  much  and  suppresses  more,  and  credit  is  equally 
given  to  what  he  tells  and  what  he  conceals.  The  petition 
is  heard  and  universally  approved.  Those  who  are  sober 
enough  to  write,  add  their  names,  and  the  rest  would  sign 
it  if  they  could. 

"  Every  man  goes  home  and  tells  his  neighbour  of  the 
glories  of  the  day ;  how  he  was  consulted,  and  what  he 
advised ;  how  he  was  invited  into  the  great  room,  where 
his  lordship  called  him  by  his  name ;  how  he  was 
caressed  by  Sir  Francis,  Sir  Joseph,  and  Sir  George ;  how 
he  ate  turtle  and  venison,  and  drank  unanimity  to  the 
three  brothers. 

"The  poor  loiterer,  whose  shop  had  confined  him  or 
whose  wife  had  locked  him  up,  hears  the  tale  of  luxury 
with  envy,  and  at  last  inquires  what  was  their  petition. 
Of  the  petition  nothing  is  remembered  by  the  narrator, 
but  that  it  spoke  much  of  fears  and  apprehensions  and 
something  very  alarming,  but  that  he  is  sure  it  is  against 
the  government. 

"  The  other  is  convinced  that  it  must  be  right,  and 
wishes  he  had  been  there,  for  he  loves  wine  and  venison, 
and  resolves  as  long  as  he  lives  to  be  against  the  government. 

"  The  petition  is  then  handed  from  town  to  town,  and 
from  house  to  house ;  and  wherever  it  comes,  the  inha- 
9 


186  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  (;cnAP. 

bitants  flock  together  that  they  may  see  that  which  must 
be  sent  to  the  king.  Names  are  easily  collected.  One 
man  signs  because  he  hates  the  papists ;  another  because 
he  has  vowed  destruction  to  the  turnpikes ;  one  because 
it  will  vex  the  parson ;  another  because  he  owes  his  land- 
lord nothing ;  one  because  he  is  rich  ;  another  because  he 
is  poor ;  one  to  show  that  he  is  not  afraid  ;  and  another 
to  show  that  he  can  write." 

The  only  writing  in  which  we  see  a  distinct  reflection 
of  Johnson's  talk  is  the  Lives  of  the  Poets.  The  excellence 
of  that  book  is  of  the  same  kind  as  the  excellence  of  his 
conversation.  Johnson  wrote  it  under  pressure,  and  it  has 
suffered  from  his  characteristic  indolence.  Modern  authors 
would  fill  as  many  pages  as  Johnson  has  filled  lines,  with 
the  biographies  of  some  of  his  heroes.  By  industriously 
sweeping  together  all  the  rubbish  which  is  in  any  way 
connected  with  the  great  man,  by  elaborately  discussing 
the  possible  significance  of  infinitesimal  bits  of  evidence, 
and  by  disquisition  upon  general  principles  or  the  whole 
mass  of  contemporary  literature,  it  is  easy  to  swell  volumes 
to  any  desired  extent.  The  result  is  sometimes  highly 
interesting  and  valuable,  as  it  is  sometimes  a  new  contri- 
bution to  the  dust-heaps ;  but  in  any  case  the  design  is 
something  quite  different  from  Johnson's.  He  has  left 
much  to  be  supplied  and  corrected  by  later  scholars.  His 
aim  is  simply  to  give  a  vigorous  summary  of  the  main 
facts  of  his  heroes'  lives,  a  pithy  analysis  of  their  cha- 
racter, and  a  short  criticism  of  their  productions.  The 
strong  sense  which  is  everywhere  displayed,  the  massive 
style,  which  is  yet  easier  and  less  cumbrous  than  in  his 
earlier  work,  and  the  uprightness  and  independence  of 
the  judgments,  make  the  book  agreeable  even  where  we 
are  most  inclined  to  dissent  from  its  conclusions. 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WHITINGS.  187 

The  criticism  is  that  of  a  school  which  has  died  out 
under  the  great  revolution  of  modern  taste.  The  book- 
sellers decided  that  English  poetry  began  for  their  pur- 
poses with  Cowley,  and  Johnson  has,,  therefore,  nothing 
to  say  about  some  of  the  greatest  names  in  our  literature. 
The  loss  is  little  to  be  regretted,  since  the  biographical 
part  of  earlier  memoirs  must  have  been  scanty,  and  the 
criticism  inappreciative.  Johnson,  it  may  be  said,  like 
most  of  his  contemporaries,  considered  poetry  almost  ex- 
clusively from  the  didactic  and  logical  point  of  view.  He 
always  inquires  what  is  the  moral  of  a  work  of  art.  If  he 
does  not  precisely  ask  "  what  it  proves,"  he  pays  excessive 
attention  to  the  logical  solidity  and  coherence  of  its  senti- 
ments. Ho  condemns  not  only  insincerity  and  affectation 
of  feeling,  but  all  such  poetic  imagery  as  does  not  cor- 
respond to  the  actual  prosaic  belief  of  the  writer.  For 
the  purely  musical  effects  of  poetry  he  has  little  or  no 
feeling,  and  allows  little  deviation  from  the  alternate  long 
and  short  syllables  neatly  bound  in  Pope's  couplets. 

To  many  readers  this  would  imply  that  Johnson  omits 
precisely  the  poetic  element  in  poetry.  I  must  be  here 
content  to  say  that  in  my  opinion  it  implies  rather  a 
limitation  than  a  fundamental  error.  Johnson  errs  in 
supposing  that  his  logical  tests  are  at  all  adequate  ;  but  it 
is,  I  think,  a  still  greater  error  to  assume  that  poetry  has 
no  connexion,  because  it  has  not  this  kind  of  connexion, 
with  philosophy.  His  criticism  has  always  a  meaning, 
and  in  the  case  of  works  belonging  to  his  own  school  a 
very  sound  meaning.  When  he  is  speaking  of  other 
poetry,  we  can  only  reply  that  his  remarks  may  be  true, 
but  that  they  are  not  to  the  purpose. 

The  remarks  on  the  poetry  of  Dryden,  Addison,  and 
Pope  are  generally  excellent,  and  always  give  the  genuine 


188  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

expression  of  an  independent  judgment.  Whoever  thinks 
for  himself,  and  says  plainly  what  he  thinks,  has  some 
merit  as  a  critic.  This,  it  is  true,  is  about  all  that  can  he 
said  for  such  criticism  as  that  on  Lycidas,  which  is  a 
delicious  example  of  the  wrong  way  of  applying  strong 
sense  to  inappropriate  topics.  Nothing  can  be  truer  in 
a  sense,  and  nothing  less  relevant. 

"  In  this  poem,"  he  says,  "  there  is  no  nature,  for  there 
is  no  truth  ;  there  is  no  art,  for  there  is  nothing  new.  Its 
form  is  that  of  a  pastoral,  easy,  vulgar,  and  therefore  dis- 
gusting; whatever  images  it  can  supply  are  easily  ex- 
hausted, and  its  inherent  improbability  always  forces 
dissatisfaction  on  the  mind.  When  Cowley  tells  of 
Hervey  that  they  studied  together,  it  is  easy  to  suppose 
how  much  he  must  miss  the  companion  of  his  labours  and 
the  partner  of  his  discoveries  ;  but  what  image  of  tender- 
ness can  be  excited  by  these  lines  ? — 

We  drove  afield,  and  both  together  heard 
What  time  the  gray  fly  winds  her  sultry  horn, 
Battening  our  flocks  \vith  the  fresh  dews  of  night. 

We  know  that  they  never  drove  a-field  and  had  no  flocks 
to  batten;  and  though  it  be  allowed  that  the  represen- 
tation may  be  allegorical,  the  true  meaning  is  so  uncertain 
and  remote  that  it  is  never  sought,  because  it  cannot  be 
known  when  it  is  found. 

"  Among  the  flocks  and  copses  and  flowers  appear  the 
heathen  deities  :  Jove  and  Phoebus,  Neptune  and  JEolus, 
with  a  long  train  of  mythological  imagery  such  as  a  college 
easily  supplies.  Nothing  can  less  display  knowledge  or 
less  exercise  invention  than  to  tell  how  a  shepherd  has 
lost  his  companion,  and  must  now  feed  his  flocks  alone, 
without  any  judge  of  his  skill  in  piping ;  how  one  god 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  189 

asks  another  god  what  has  become  of  Lycidas,  and  neither 
god  can  tell.  He  who  thus  grieves  will  excite  no  sym- 
pathy ;  he  who  thus  praises  will  confer  no  honour." 

This  is  of  course  utterly  outrageous,  and  yet  much  of  it 
is  undeniably  true.  To  explain  why,  in  spite  of  truth, 
Lycidas  is  a  wonderful  poem,  would  be  to  go  pretty  deeply 
into  the  theory  of  poetic  expression.  Most  critics  prefer 
simply  to  shriek,  being  at  any  rate  safe  from  the  errors  of 
independent  judgment. 

The  general  effect  of  tho  book,  however,  is  not  to  bo 
inferred  from  this  or  some  other  passages  of  antiquated 
and  eccentric  criticism.  It  is  the  shrewd  sense  every- 
where cropping  up  which  is  really  delightful.  The  keen 
remarks  upon  life  and  character,  though,  perhaps,  rather 
too  severe  in  tone,  are  worthy  of  a  vigorous  mind,  stored 
with  much  experience  of  many  classes,  and  braced  by 
constant  exercise  in  the  conversational  arena.  Passages 
everywhere  abound  which,  though  a  little  more  formal  in 
expression,  have  the  forcible  touch  of  his  best  conver- 
sational sallies.  Some~o£-ihe  prejudices,  which  are  ex- 
pressed more  pithily  in  Boswell,  are  defended  by  a  reasoned 
exposition  in  the  Lives.  Sentence  is  passed  with  the  true 
judicial  air ;  and  if  he  does  not  convince  us  of  his  com- 
plete impartiality,  he  at  least  bases  his  decisions  upon 
solid  and  worthy  grounds.  It  would  be  too  much,  for 
example,  to  expect  that  Johnson  should  sympathize  with 
the  grand  republicanism  of  Milton,  or  pardon  a  man  who 
defended  the  execution  of  the  blessed  Martyr.  lie  failed, 
therefore,  to  satisfy  the  ardent  admirers  of  the  great  poet. 
Yet  his  judgment  is  not  harsh  or  ungenerous,  but,  at 
worst,  the  judgment  of  a  man  striving  to  be  just,  in  spite 
of  some  inevitable  want  of  sympathy. 

The  quality  of  Johnson's  incidental  remarks  may  bo 


190  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

inferred  from  one  or  two  brief  extracts.  Here  is  an 
observation  which  Johnson  must  have  had  many  chances 
of  verifying.  Speaking  of  Dry  den's  money  difficulties,  he 
says,  "  It  is  well  known  that  he  seldom  lives  frugally  who 
lives  by  chance.  Hope  is  always  liberal,  and  they  that 
trust  her  promises,  make  little  scruple  of  revelling  to-day 
on  the  profits  of  the  morrow." 

Here  is  another  shrewd  comment  upon  the  compliments 
paid  to  Halifax,  of  whom  Pope  says  in  the  character  of 
Bufo,— 

Fed  with  soft  dedications  all  day  long, 
Horace  and  he  went  hand  and  hand  in  song. 

"  To  charge  all  unmerited  praise  with  the  guilt  of  flattery, 
or  to  suppose  that  the  encomiast  always  knows  and  feels 
the  falsehoods  of  his  assertions,  is  surely  to  discover  great 
ignorance  of  human  nature  and  of  human  life.  In  deter- 
minations depending  not  on  rules,  but  on  reference  and 
comparison,  judgment  is  always  in  some  degree  subject 
to  affection.  Very  near  to  admiration  is  the  wish  to 
admire. 

"  Every  man  willingly  gives  value  to  the  praise  which 
he  receives,  and  considers  the  sentence  passed  in  his  favour 
as  the  sentence  of  discernment.  We  admire  in  a  friend 
that  understanding  that  selected  us  for  confidence;  we 
admire  more  in  a  patron  that  bounty  which,  instead  of 
scattering  bounty  indiscriminately,  directed  it  to  us ;  and 
if  the  patron  be  an  author,  those  performances  which 
gratitude  forbids  us  to  blame,  affection  will  easily  dispose 
us  to  exalt. 

"  To  these  prejudices,  hardly  culpable,  interest  adds  a 
power  always  operating,  though  not  always,  because  not 
willingly,  perceived.  The  modesty  of  praise  gradually 


vi.]  JOHNSON'S  WAITINGS.  191 

•wears  away ;  and,  perhaps,  the  pride  of  patronage  may  be 
in  time  so  increased  that  modest  praise  will  no  longer 
please. 

"Many  a  blandishment  was  practised  upon  Halifax, 
which  he  would  never  have  known  had  he  no  other  at- 
tractions than  those  of  his  poetry,  of  which  a  short  time 
has  withered  the  beauties.  It  would  now  be  esteemed  no 
honour  by  a  contributor  to  the  monthly  bundles  of  verses, 
to  be  told  that,  in  strains  either  familiar  or  solemn,  ho 
sings  like  Halifax." 

I  will  venture  to  make  a  longer  quotation  from  the  life 
of  Pope,  which  gives,  I  think,  a  good  impression  of  his 
manner : — 

"  Of  his  social  qualities,  if  an  estimate  be  made  from 
his  letters,  an  opinion  too  favourable  cannot  easily  bo 
formed ;  they  exhibit  a  perpetual  and  unclouded  effulgence 
of  general  benevolence  and  particular  fondness.  There  is 
nothing  but  liberality,  gratitude,  constancy,  and  tender- 
ness. It  has  been  so  long  said  as  to  be  commonly  be- 
lieved, that  the  true  characters  of  men  may  be  found  in 
their  letters,  and  that  he  who  writes  to  his  friend  lays  his 
heart  open  before  him. 

"But  the  truth  is,  that  such  were  the  simple  friend- 
ships of  the  Golden  Age,  and  are  now  the  friendships 
only  of  children.  Very  few  can  boast  of  hearts  which 
they  dare  lay  open  to  themselves,  and  of  which,  by  what- 
ever accident  exposed,  they  do  not  shun  a  distinct  and 
continued  view;  and  certainly  what  we  hide  from  our- 
selves, we  do  not  show  to  our  friends.  There  is,  indeed, 
no  transaction  which  offers  stronger  temptations  to  fallacy 
and  sophistication  than  epistolary  intercourse. 

"  In  the  eagerness  of  conversation,  the  first  emotions  of 
the  mind  often  burst  out  before  they  are  considered.  In 


193  SAMUEL  JOHNSON  [CHAP. 

the  tumult  of  business,  interest  and  passion  have  their 
genuine  effect ;  but  a  friendly  letter  is  a  calm  and  deli- 
berate performance  in  the  cool  of  leisure,  in  the  stillness 
of  solitude,  and  surely  no  man  sits  down  by  design  to 
depreciate  his  own  character. 

"  Friendship  has  no  tendency  to  secure  veracity  ;  for  by 
whom  can  a  man  so  much  wish  to  be  thought  better  than 
he  is,  as  by  him  whose  kindness  he  desires  to  gain  or 
keep  ?  Even  in  writing  to  the  world  there  is  less  con- 
straint ;  the  author  is  not  confronted  with  his  reader,  and 
takes  his  chance  of  approbation  among  the  different  dis- 
positions of  mankind ;  but  a  letter  is  addressed  to  a  single 
mind,  of  which  the  prejudices  and  partialities  are  known, 
and  must  therefore  please,  if  not  by  favouring  them,  by 
forbearing  to  oppose  them.  To  charge  those  favourable 
representations  which  men  give  of  their  own  minds,  with 
the  guilt  of  hypocritical  falsehood,  would  show  more 
severity  than  knowledge.  The  writer  commonly  believes 
himself.  Almost  every  man's  thoughts  while  they  are 
general  are  right,  and  most  hearts  are  pure  while  tempta- 
tion is  away.  It  is  easy  to  awaken  generous  sentiments 
in  privacy;  to  despise  death  when  there  is  no  danger;  to 
glow  with  benevolence  when  there  is  nothing  to  be  given. 
"While  such  ideas  are  formed  they  are  felt,  and  self-love 
does  not  suspect  the  gleam  of  virtue  to  be  the  meteor  of 
fancy. 

"  If  the  letters  of  Pope  are  considered  merely  as  com- 
positions, they  seem  to  be  premeditated  and  artificial.  It 
is  one  thing  to  write,  because  there  is  something  which 
the  mind  wishes  to  discharge ;  and  another  to  solicit  the 
imagination,  because  ceremony  or  vanity  requires  some- 
thing to  be  written.  Pope  confesses  his  early  letters  to 
be  vitiated  with  affectation  and  ambition.  To  know 


VT.]  JOHNSON'S  WETTINGS.  193 

whether  he  disentangles  himself  from  these  perverters  of 
epistolary  integrity,  his  book  and  his  life  must  be  set  in 
comparison.  One  of  his  favourite  topics  is  contempt  of 
his  own  poetry.  For  this,  if  it  had  been  real,  he  would 
deserve  no  commendation ;  and  in  this  he  was  certainly 
not  sincere,  for  his  high  value  of  himself  was  sufficiently 
observed;  and  of  what  could  he  be  proud  but  of  his 
poetry]  He  writes,  he  says,  when  'he  has  just  nothing 
else  to  do,'  yet  Swift  complains  that  he  was  never  at 
leisure  for  conversation,  because  he  'had  always  some 
poetical  scheme  in  his  head.'  It  was  punctually  required 
that  his  writing-box  should  be  set  upon  his  bed  before  ho 
rose ;  and  Lord  Oxford's  domestic  related  that,  in  the 
dreadful  winter  of  '40,  she  was  called  from  her  bed  by 
him  four  times  in  one  night,  to  supply  him  with  paper 
lest  he  should  lose  a  thought. 

"  He  pretends  insensibility  to  censure  and  criticism, 
though  it  was  observed  by  all  who  knew  him  that  every 
pamphlet  disturbed  his  quiet,  and  that  his  extreme  irrita- 
bility laid  him  open  to  perpetual  vexation ;  but  he  wished 
to  despise  his  critics,  and  therefore  hoped  he  did  despise 
them.  As  he  happened  to  live  in  two  reigns  when  the 
court  paid  little  attention  to  poetry,  he  nursed  in  his 
mind  a  foolish  disesteem  of  kings,  and  proclaims  that  '  he 
never  sees  courts.'  Yet  a  little  regard  shown  him  by  the 
Prince  of  Wales  melted  his  obduracy;  and  he  had  not 
much  to  say  when  he  was  asked  by  his  Royal  Highness, 
'  How  he  could  love  a  prince  while  he  disliked  kings. ' " 

Johnson's  best  poetry  is  the  versified  expression  of  the 
tone  of  sentiment  with  which  we  are  already  familiar. 
The  Vanity  of  Human  Wishes  is,  perhaps,  the  finest 
poem  written  since  Pope's  time  and  in  Pope's  manner, 
with  the  exception  of  Goldsmith's  still  finer  performances. 
9* 


194  SAMUEL  JOHNSON.  [CHAP. 

Johnson,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  has  not  Goldsmith's 
exquisite  fineness  of  touch  and  delicacy  of  sentiment.  He 
is  often  ponderous  and  verbose,  and  one  feels  that  the 
mode  of  expression  is  not  that  which  is  most  congenial ; 
and  yet  the  vigour  of  thought  makes  itself  felt  through 
rather  clumsy  modes  of  utterance.  Here  is  one  of  the 
best  passages,  in  which  he  illustrates  the  vanity  of  mili- 
tary glory : — 

On  what  foundation  stands  the  warrior's  pride, 

How  just  his  hopes  let  Swedish  Charles  decide  j 

A  frame  of  adamant,  a  soul  of  fire, 

No  dangers  fright  him  and  no  labours  tire ; 

O'er  love,  o'er  fear,  extends  his  wide  domain, 

Unconquer'd  lord  of  pleasure  and  of  pain ; 

No  joys  to  him  pacific  sceptres  yield, 

War  sounds  the  trump,  he  rushes  to  the  field ; 

Behold  surrounding  kings  their  powers  combine, 

And  one  capitulate,  and  one  resign : 

Peace  courts  his  hand,  but  spreads  her  charms  in  vain. 

"  Think  nothing  gain'd,"  he  cries,  "  till  nought  remain  j 

On  Moscow's  walls  till  Gothic  standards  fly, 

And  all  be  mine  beneath  the  polar  sky." 

The  march  begins  in  military  state, 

And  nations  on  his  eye  suspended  wait ; 

Stern  Famine  guards  the  solitary  coast, 

And  Winter  barricades  the  realms  of  Frost. 

He  comes,  nor  want  nor  cold  his  course  delay — 

Hide,  blushing  glory,  hide  Pultowa's  day ! 

The  vanquish'd  hero  leaves  his  broken  bands, 

And  shows  his  miseries  in  distant  lands ; 

Condemn'd  a  needy  supplicant  to  wait, 

While  ladies  interpose  and  slaves  debate  — 

But  did  not  Chance  at  length  her  error  mend  P 

Did  no  subverted  empire  mark  his  end  ? 

Did  rival  monarchs  give  the  fatal  wound  ? 

Or  hostile  millions  press  him  to  the  ground  ? 

His  fall  was  destined  to  a  barren  strand, 

A  petty  fortress  and  a  dubious  hand ; 


TI.]  JOHNSON'S  WRITINGS.  1U5 

He  left  the  name  at  which  the  world  grew  palo, 
To  point  a  moral  and  adorn  a  tale. 

The  concluding  passage  may  also  fitly  conclude  this 
survey  of  Johnson's  writings.  The  sentiment  is  less 
gloomy  than  is  usual,  but  it  gives  the  answer  which  he 
would  have  given  in  his  calmer  moods  to  the  perplexed 
riddle  of  life ;  and,  in  some  form  or  other,  it  is,  perhaps, 
the  best  or  the  only  answer  that  can  be  given : — 

Where,  then,  shall  Hope  and  Fear  their  objects  find  ? 

Must  dull  suspense  corrupt  the  stagnant  mind  ? 

Must  helpless  man,  in  ignorance  sedate, 

Roll  darkling  down  the  torrent  of  his  fate  ? 

Must  no  dislike  alarm,  no  wishes  rise  ? 

No  cries  invoke  the  mercies  of  the  skies  ? 

Inquirer  cease ;  petitions  yet  remain 

Which  Heaven  may  hear,  nor  deem  religion  vain ; 

Still  raise  for  good  the  supplicating  voice, 

But  leave  to  Heaven  the  measure  and  the  choice 

Safe  in  His  power  whose  eyes  discern  afar 

The  secret  ambush  of  a  specious  prayer. 

Implore  His  aid,  in  His  decisions  rest, 

Secure  whate'er  He  gives — He  gives  the  best. 

Yet  when  the  scene  of  sacred  presence  fires, 

And  strong  devotion  to  the  skies  aspires, 

Pour  forth  thy  fervours  for  a  healthful  mind, 

Obedient  passions  and  a  will  resign'd ; 

For  Love,  which  scarce  collective  men  can  fill ; 

For  Patience,  sovereign  o'er  transmuted  ill ; 

For  Faith,  that  panting  for  a  happier  seat, 

Counts  Death  kind  nature's  signal  of  retreat. 

These  goods  for  man  the  laws  of  Heaven  ordain, 

These  goods  He  grants  who  grants  the  power  to  gain ; 

With  these  Celestial  Wisdom  calms  the  mind, 

And  makes  the  happiness  she  does  not  find. 


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CICERO'S  OFFICES,  &c. — CICERO  ON  ORATORY  AND  ORATORS. — 
TACITUS  (2  vols.). — TERENCE. — SOPHOCLES. — JUVENAL. —  XEXO- 
pnoN. — HOMER'S  ILIAD. — HOMER'S  ODYSSEY. — HERODOTUS. — DE- 
MOSTHENES (2  vols.). — THUCYDIDES. — .^ESCHYLUS. — EURIPIDES  (2 
vols.). — LIVY  (2  vols.)- — PLATO  [Select  Dialogues  J. 

LIVINGSTONE'S  SOUTH  AFRICA.  Missionary  Travels  and  Re- 
searches in  South  Africa :  including  a  Sketch  of  Sixteen  Years'  Resi- 
dence in  the  Interior  of  Africa,  and  a  Journey  from  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  to  Loanda  on  the  West  Coast ;  thence  across  the  Continent,  down 
the  River  Zambesi,  to  the  Eastern  Ocean.  By  DAVID  LIVINGSTOM:, 
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besi and  its  Tributaries,  and  of  the  Discovery  of  the  Lakes  Shirwa  and 
Nyassa,  1858-18G4.  By  DAVID  and  CHARLKS  LIVINGSTONE:.  With 
Map  and  Illustrations.  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00 ;  Sheep,  $5  50 ;  Half  Calf, 
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LIVINGSTONE'S  LAST  JOURNALS.  The  Last  Journals  of  David 
Livingstone,  in  Central  Africa,  from  1865  to  his  Death.  Continued  by 
a  Narrative  of  his  Last  Moments  and  Sufferings,  obtained  from  his 
Faithful  Servants  Chuma  and  Susi.  By  HORACE  WALLER,  F.R.G. S., 
Rector  of  Twywell,  Northampton.  With  Portrait,  Maps,  and  Illustra- 
tions. 8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00  ;  Sheep,  $5  50 ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25.  Cheap 
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GROTE'S  HISTORY  OF  GREECE.  12  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $18  00; 
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RECLUS'S  EARTH.     The  Earth :  a  Descriptive  History  of  the  Phe- 
nomena of  the  Life  of  the  Globe.    By  ELISEE  RECLUS.    With  234  Maps 
and  Illustrations,  and  23  Page  Maps  printed  in  Colors.     8vo,  Cloth 
$5  00 ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

RECLUS'S  OCEAN.  The  Ocean,  Atmosphere,  and  Life.  Being  the 
Second  Series  of  a  Descriptive  History  of  the  Life  of  the  Globe.  By 
ELISEE  RECLUS.  Profusely  Illustrated  with  250  Maps  or  Figures,  and 
27  Maps  printed  in  Colors.  8vo,  Cloth,  $G  00 ;  Half  Calf,  $8  25. 

NORDIIOFF'S  COMMUNISTIC  SOCIETIES  OF  THE  UNITED 
STATES.  The  Communistic  Societies  of  the  United  States,  from  Per- 
sonal Visit  and  Observation  ;  including  Detailed  Accounts  of  the  Econ- 
omists, Zoarites,  Shakers,  the  Amana,  Oneida,  Bethel,  Aurora,  Icarian, 
and  other  existing  Societies.  With  Particulars  of  their  Religious  Creeds 
and  Practices,  their  Social  Theories  and  Life,  Numbers,  Industries,  and 
Present  Condition.  By  CHARLES  NORDHOFF.  Illustrations.  8vo, 
Cloth,  $4  00. 

NORDHOFF'S  CALIFORNIA.  California:  for  Health,  Pleasure,  and 
Residence.  A  Book  for  Travellers  and  Settlers.  Illustrated.  8vo, 
Cloth,  $2  50. 

NORDHOFF'S  NORTHERN  CALIFORNIA,  OREGON,  AND  THE 
SANDWICH  ISLANDS.  Northern  California,  Oregon,  and  the  Sand- 
wich Islands.  By  CHARLES  NORDHOFF.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth, 

$2  50. 

PARTON'S  CARICATURE.  Caricature  and  Other  Comic  Art,  in  All 
Times  and  Many  Lands.  By  JAMES  PARTON.  With  203  Illustrations. 
8vo,  Cloth,  Gilt  Tops  and  uncut  edges,  $5  00. 

*RAWLINSON'S  MANUAL  OF  ANCIENT  HISTORY.  A  Manual 
of  Ancient  History,  from  the  Earliest  Times  to  the  Fall  of  the  Western 
Empire.  Comprising  the  History  of  Chaldaea,  Assyria,  Media,  Baby- 
lonia, Lydia,  Phrcnicia,  Syria,  Judrca,  Egypt,  Carthage,  Persia,  Greece, 
Macedonia,  Parthia,  and  Rome.  By  GEORGE  RAWLINSON,  M.A., 
Camden  Professor  of  Ancient  History  in  the  University  of  Oxford. 
12mo,  Cloth,  $1  46. 

NICHOLS'S  ART  EDUCATION.  Art  Education  applied  to  Industry. 
By  GEORGE  WARD  NICHOLS,  Author  of  "The  Story  of  the  Great 
March."  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00. 

BAKER'S  ISMAIL!  A.  Ismail'ia:  a  Narrative  of  the  Expedition  to  Cen- 
tral Africa  for  the  Suppression  of  the  Slave-trade,  organized  by  Ismail, 
Khedive  of  Egypt.  By  Sir  SAMUEL  WHITE  BAKER,  PASHA,  F.R.S., 
F.R.G.S.  With  Maps,  Portraits,  and  Illustrations.  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00 ; 
Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

BOSWELL'S  JOHNSON.  The  Life  of  Samuel  Johnson,  LL.D.,  in- 
cluding a  Journal  of  a  Tour  to  the  Hebrides.  By  JAMES  BOSWELL, 
Esq.  Edited  by  JOHN  WILSON  CROKER,  LL.D.,  F.R.S.  With  a  Por- 
trait of  Boswell.  2  vols.»8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00 ;  Sheep,  $5  00  ;  Half  Calf, 
$8  50. 


6     Valuable  and  Interesting  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries. 

VAN-LENNEPS  BIBLE  LANDS.  Bible  Lands :  their  Modern  Cus. 
toms  and  Manners  Illustrative  of  Scripture.  By  the  Rev.  HENRY  J. 
VAN-LENNEP,  D.D.  Illustrated  with  upward  of  350  Wood  Engravings 
and  two  Colored  Maps.  838  pp.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;  Sheep,  $G  00 ; 
Half  Morocco,  $8  00. 

VINCENT'S  LAND  OF  THE  WHITE  ELEPHANT.  The  Land  of 
the  White  Elephant :  Sights  and  Scenes  in  Southeastern  Asia.  A  Per- 
sonal Narrative  of  Travel  and  Adventure  in  Farther  India,  embracing 
the  Countries  of  Burma,  Siam,  Cambodia,  and  Cochin-China  (1871-2). 
By  FRANK  VINCENT,  Jr.  Illustrated  with  Maps,  Plans,  and  Woodcuts. 
Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $3  50. 

SHAKSPEARE.  The  Dramatic  Works  of  William  Shakspeare.  With 
Corrections  and  Notes.  Engravings.  6  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $9  00.  2 
vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $4  00;  Sheep,  $5  00.  In  one  vol.,  8vo,  Sheep, 
$4  00. 

SMILES'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  HUGUENOTS.  The  Huguenots: 
their  Settlements,  Churches,  and  Industries  in  England  and  Ireland. 
By  SAMUEL  SMILES.  With  an  Appendix  relating  to  the  Huguenots  in 
America.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

SMILES'S  HUGUENOTS  AFTER  THE  REVOCATION.  The  Hu- 
guenots in  France  after  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes ;  with  a 
Visit  to  the  Country  of  the  Vaudois.  By  SAMUEL  SMILES.  Crown 
8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

SMILES'S  LIFE  OF  THE  STEPHENSONS.  The  Life  of  George 
Stephenson,  and  of  his  Son,  Robert  Stephenson;  comprising,  also,  a 
History  of  the  Invention  and  Introduction  of  the  Railway  Locomotive. 
By  SAMUEL  SMILES.  With  Steel  Portraits  and  numerous  Illustrations. 
8vo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

SQUIER'S  PERU.  Peru :  Incidents  of  Travel  and  Exploration  in  the 
Land  of  the  Incas.  By  E.  GEORGE  SQUIER,  M.A.,  F.S.A.,  late  U.  S. 
Commissioner  to  Peru,  Author  of  "  Nicaragua,"  "Ancient  Monuments 
of  Mississippi  Valley,"  &c.,  &c.  With  Illustrations.  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00. 

STRICKLAND'S  (Miss)  QUEENS  OF  SCOTLAND.  Lives  of  the 
Queens  of  Scotland  and  English  Princesses  connected  with  the  Regal 
Succession  of  Great  Britain.  By  AGNES  STRICKLAND.  8  vols.,  12mo, 
Cloth,  $12  00  ;  Half  Calf,  $26  00. 

THE  -'CHALLENGER"  EXPEDITION.  The  Atlantic:  an  Account 
of  the  General  Results  of  the  Exploring  Expedition  of  H.  M.S.  "Chal- 
lenger." By  Sir  WYVILLE  THOMSON,  K.C.B.,  F.R.S.  With  numer- 
ous Illustrations,  Colored  Maps,  and  Charts,  from  Drawings  by  J.  J. 
Wyld,  engraved  bv  J.  D.  Cooper,  and  Portrait  of  the  Author,  engraved 
by'C.  H.  Jeens.  "2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $12  00. 

BOURNE'S  LIFE  OF  JOHN  LOCKE.  The  Life  of  John  Locke.  By 
H,  R.  Fox  BOURNE.  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth^uncut  edges  and  gilt  tops, 
$5  00. 


Valuable  and  Interesting  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries.      7 

XLISON'S  HISTORY  OF  EUROPE.  FIRST  SERIES  :  From  the  Com- 
mencement of  the  French  Revolution,  in  1781),  to  the  Restoration  oi 
the  Bourbons  in  1815.  [In  addition  to  the  Notes  on  Chapter  LXXVI., 
which  correct  the  errors  of  the  original  work  concerning  the  United 
States,  a  copious  Analytical  Index  has  been  appended  to  this  American 
Edition.]  SECOND  SERIES:  From  the  Fall  of  Napoleon,  in  1815,  to 
the  Accession  of  Lonis  Napoleon,  in  1852.  8  vols..  8vo,  Cloth,  $16  00; 
Sheep,  $20  00;  Half  Calf,  $34  00. 

WALLACE'S  GEOGRAPHICAL  DISTRIBUTION  OF  ANIMALS. 
The  Geographical  Distribution  of  Animals.  With  a  Study  of  the  Re- 
lations of  Living  and  Extinct  Faunas  as  Elucidating  the  Past  Changes 
of  the  Earth's  Surface.  By  ALFRED  RUSSKL  WALLACE.  With  Maps 
and  Illustrations.  In  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $10  00. 

WALLACE'S  MALAY  ARCHIPELAGO.  The  Malay  Archipelago: 
the  Land  of  the  Orang-Utan  and  the  Bird  of  Paradise.  A  Narrative 
of  Travel,  1854-18G2.  With  Studies  of  Man  and  Nature.  By  ALFRED 
RUSSEL  WALLACE.  With  Ten  Maps  and  Fifty-one  Elegant  Illustra 
tions.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 

GIBBON'S  ROME.  The  History  of  the  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman 
Empire.  By  EDWARD  GIBBON.  With  Notes  by  Rev.  II.  H.  MILMAN 
and  M.  GUIZOT.  With  Index.  6  vols.,  12mo/Cloth,  $4  80;  Sheep, 
$7  20 ;  Half  Calf,  $15  30. 

GRIFFIS'S  JAPAN.  The  Mikado's  Empire:  Book  I.  History  of  Japan, 
from  C60  B.C.  to  1872  A.D.  Book  II.  Personal  Experiences,  Observa- 
tions, and  Studies  in  Japan,  1870-1874.  By  WILLIAM  ELLIOT  GRIF- 
FIS,  A.M.,  late  of  the  Imperial  University  of  Tokio,  Japan.  Copiously 
Illustrated.  Svo,  Cloth,  $4  00 ;  Half  Calf,  $6  25. 

THOMPSON'S  PAPACY  AND  THE  CIVIL  POWER.  The  Papacy 
nnd  the  Civil  Power.  By  the  Hon.  R.  W.  THOMPSON,  Secretary  of 
the  U.  S.  Navy.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 

THE  POETS  AND  POETRY  OF  SCOTLAND :  from  the  Earliest 
to  the  Present  Time.  Comprising  Characteristic  Selections  from  tho 
Works  of  the  more  Noteworthy  Scottish  Poets,  with  Biographical  and 
Critical  Notices.  By  JAMES  GRANT  WILSON.  With  Portraits  on  Steel. 
2  volumes,  Svo,  Cloth,  $10  00;  Half  Calf,  $14  60;  Full  Morocco, 
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QCEENS  OP  ENGLAND  (Abridged).  — ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  THK 
EAST.  —  HALLAM'S  MIDDLE  AGES.  —  HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL 
HISTORY  OF  ENGLAND. — LYELL'S  ELEMENTS  OF  GEOLOGY. — MERI- 
VALE'S  GENERAL  HISTORY  OF  ROME. — Cox's  GENERAL  HISTORY 
OF  GREECE. — CLASSICAL  DICTIONARY.  Price  $1  46  per  volume. 

LEWIS'S  HISTORY  OF  GERMANY.     Pii>-e  $1   75. 


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CARLYLE'S  FREDERICK  THE  GREAT.  History  of  Friedrich  II., 
called  Frederick  the  Great.  By  THOMAS  CARLTLE.  Portraits,  Maps, 
Plans,  &c.  6  vols.,  12rao,  Cloth,  $12  00;  Sheep,  $14  40;  Half  Calf, 

$22  50. 

THE  REVISION  OF  THE  ENGLISH  VERSION  OF  THE  NEW 
TESTAMENT.     "With  an  Introduction  by  the  Rev.  P.  SCHAFF,  D.D. 
618  pp.,  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $3  00. 
This  work  embraces  in  one  volume : 

I.  ON  A  FRESH  REVISION  OF  THE  ENGLISH  NEW  TES* 
TAMENT.  By  J.  B.  LIGHTFOOT,  D.D.,  Canon  of  St.  Paul's, 
and  Hulsean  Professor  of  Divinity,  Cambridge.  Second  Edition, 
Revised.  196  pp. 

II.  ON  THE  AUTHORIZED  VERSION  OF  THE  NEW  TES- 
TAMENT in  Connection  with  some  Recent  Proposals  for  its 
Revision.  By  RICHAKD  CIIENEVIX  TRENCH,  D.D.,  Arch- 
bishop of  Dublin.  194pp. 

III.  CONSIDERATIONS  ON  THE  REVISION  OF  THE  EN- 
GLISH VERSION  OF  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT.  By  C. 
J.  ELLICOTT,  D.D.,  Bishop  of  Gloucester  and  Bristol.  178  pp. 

ADDISON'S  COMPLETE  WORKS.  The  Works  of  Joseph  Addison, 
embracing  the  whole  of  the  Spectator.  3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $6  00; 
Sheep,  $7  50 ;  Half  Calf,  $12  75. 

ANNUAL  RECORD  OF  SCIENCE  AND  INDUSTRY.  The  Annual 
Record  of  Science  and  Industry.  Edited  by  Professor  SPENCER  F. 
BAIRD,  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  with  the  Assistance  of  Eminent 
MenofScience.  The  Yearly  Volumes  for  1871, 1872,  1873, 1874, 1875, 
1876  are  ready.  12mo,  Cloth,  $2  00  per  vol. 

BROUGHAM'S  AUTOBIOGRAPHY.  Life  and  Times  of  Henry,  Lord 
Brougham.  Written  by  Himself.  3  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $G  00. 

BULWER'S  HORACE.  The  Odes  and  Epodes  of  Horace.  A  Metrical 
Translation  into  English.  With  Introduction  and  Commentaries.  By 
LORD  LYTTON.  With  Latin  Text  from  the  Editions  of  Orelli,  Mac- 
leane,  and  Yonge.  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  75. 

BULWER'S  KING  ARTHUR.  King  Arthur.  A  Poem.  By  LORD 
LYTTON.  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  75. 

BULWER'S  PROSE  WORKS.  The  Miscellaneous  Prose  Works  of 
Edward  Bulwer,  Lord  Lytton.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $3  50.  Also,  in 
uniform  style,  Caxtoniana.  12mo,  Cloth,  $1  75. 

DAVIS'S  CARTHAGE.  Carthage  and  her  Remains :  being  an  Account 
of  the  Excavations  and  Researches  on  the  Site  of  the  Phoenician  Me- 
tropolis in  Africa  and  other  Adjacent  Places.  Conducted  under  the 
Auspices  of  Her  Majesty's  Government.  By  Dr.  N.  DAVIS,  F.R.G.S. 
Profusely  Illustrated  with  Maps,  Woodcuts,  Chromo-Lithographs,  &c. 
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CAMERON'S  ACROSS  AFRICA.  Across  Africa.  By  VERNEY  Lov- 
ETT  CAMERON,  C.B.,  D.C.L.,  Commander  Royal  Navy,  Gold  Medal- 
ist Royal  Geographical  Society,  &c.  With  a  Map  and  Numerous  Illus- 
trations. 8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00. 

CARLYLE'S  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.  The  French  Revolution  :  a 
History.  By  THOMAS  CARLYLE.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $3  50;  Sheep, 
$4  30 ;  Half  Calf,  $7  00. 

CARLYLE'S  OLIVER  CROMWELL.  Oliver  Cromwell's  Letters  and 
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dations. By  THOMAS  CAULYLE.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $3  50;  Sheep, 
$4  30;  Half  Calf,  $7  00. 

EARTH'S  NORTH  AND  CENTRAL  AFRICA.  Travels  and  Dis- 
coveries in  North  and  Central  Africa  :  being  a  Journal  of  an  Expedi- 
tion undertaken  under  the  Auspices  of  H.B.M.'s  Government,  in  the 
Years  1849-1855.  By  HENRY  BARTH,  Ph.D.,  D.C.L.  Illustrated. 
3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $12  00 ;  Sheep,  $13  50  ;  Half  Calf,  $18  75. 

THOMSON'S  LAND  AND  BOOK.  The  Land  and  the  Book ;  or, 
Biblical  Illustrations  drawn  from  the  Manners  and  Customs,  the  Scenes 
and  the  Scenery,  of  the  Holy  Land.  By  W.  M.  THOMSON,  D.D.,  Twen- 
ty-five Years  a  Missionary  of  the  A.B.C.F.M.  in  Syria  and  Palestine. 
With  two  elaborate  Maps  of  Palestine,  an  accurate  Plan  of  Jerusalem, 
and  several  hundred  Engravings,  representing  the  Scenery,  Topogra- 
phy, and  Productions  of  the  Holy  Land,  and  the  Costumes,  Manners, 
and  Habits  of  the  People.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $5  00 ;  Sheep,  $G  00 ; 
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TENNYSON'S  COMPLETE  POEMS.  The  Poetical  Works  of  Alfred 
Tennyson,  Poet  Laureate.  With  numerous  Illustrations  by  Eminent 
Artists,  and  Three  Characteristic  Portraits.  8vo,  Paper,  $1  00 ;  Cloth, 
$1  50. 

CRUISE  OF  THE  "  CHALLENGER."  Voyages  over  many  Seas, 
Scenes  in  many  Lands.  By  W.  J.  J.  SPRY,  R.N.  With  Map  and  Il- 
lustrations. Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00. 

DU  CHAILLU'S  AFRICA.  Explorations  and  Adventures  in  Equa- 
torial Africa :  with  Accounts  of  the  Manners  and  Customs  of  the  Peo- 
ple, and  of  the  Chase  of  the  Gorilla,  the  Crocodile,  Leopard,  Elephant, 
Hippopotamus,  and  other  Animals.  By  PAUL  B.  Do  CHAILLU.  Illus- 
trated. 8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00 ;  Sheep,  $5  50 ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

DU  CHAILLU'S  ASHANGO  LAND.  A  Journey  to  Ashango  Land, 
and  Further  Penetration  into  Equatorial  Africa.  By  PAUL  B.  Du 
CHAILLU.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;  Sheep,  $5  50;  Half  Calf, 

$7  25. 

WHITE'S  MASSACRE  OF  ST.  BARTHOLOMEW.  The  Massacre 
of  St.  Bartholomew :  Preceded  by  a  History  of  the  Religious  Wars  in 
the  Reign  of  Charles  IX.  By  HENRY  WHITE,  M.A.  With  Illustra- 
tions. Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $1  75. 


IO    Valuable  ana'  Interesting  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries. 

DRAPER'S  CIVIL  WAR.  History  of  the  American  Civil  War.  UN- 
JOHN  W.  DRAPER,  M.D.,  LL.D.  3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  Beveled  Edges, 
$10  50;  Sheep,  $12  00;  Half  Calf,  $17  25. 

DRAPER'S  INTELLECTUAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  EUROPE.  A 
History  of  the  Intellectual  Development  of  Europe.  By  JOHN  W. 
DRAPER,  M.D.,  LL.D.  New  Edition,  Revised.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth, 
$3  00 ;  Half  Calf,  $6  50. 

DRAPER'S  AMERICAN  CIVIL  POLICY.  Thoughts  on  the  Future 
Civil  Policy  of  America.  By  JOHN  W.  DRAPER,  M.D.,  LL.D.,  Pro- 
fessor of  Chemistry  and  Physiology  in  the  University  of  New  York. 
Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  00  ;  Half  Morocco,  $3  75. 

WOOD'S  HOMES  WITHOUT  HANDS.  Homes  Without  Hands: 
being  a  Description  of  the  Habitations  of  Animals,  classed  according  to 
their  Principle  of  Construction.  By  J.  G.  WOOD,  M.A.,  F.L.S.  Il- 
lustrated. 8vo,  Cloth,  $4  50 ;  Sheep  or  Roan,  $5  00 ;  Half  Calf,  8<3  75. 

FLAMMARION'S  ATMOSPHERE.  The  Atmosphere.  Translated 
from  the  French  of  CAMILLE  FLAMMARION.  Edited  by  JAMES  GLAI- 
SHER,  F.R.S.,  Superintendent  of  the  Magnetical  and  Meteorological 
Department  of  the  Royal  Observatory  at  Greenwich.  With  10  Chromo- 
Lithographs  and  8G  Woodcuts.  8vo,  Cloth,  $6  00 ;  Half  Calf,  $8  25. 

ABBOTT'S  DICTIONARY  OF  RELIGIOUS  KNOWLEDGE.  A 
Dictionary  of  Religious  KnoNvledge,  for  Popular  and  Professional  Use  ; 
comprising  full  Information  on  Biblical,  Theological,  and  Ecclesiastical 
Subjects.  With  nearly  One  Thousand  Maps  and  Illustrations.  Ed- 
ited by  the  Rev.  LYAIAN  ABBOTT,  with  the  Co-operation  of  the  Rev. 
T.  C.  COXANT,  D.I).  Royal  8vo,  containing  over  1000  pages,  Cloth, 
$6  00 ;  Sheep,  $7  00  ;  Half  Morocco,  $8  50. 

ABBOTT'S  FREDERICK  THE  GREAT.  The  History  of  Frederick 
the  Second,  called  Frederick  the  Great.  By  JOHN  S.  C.  ABBOTT.  Il- 
lustrated. 8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

ABBOTT'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.  The 
French  Revolution  of  1789,  as  viewed  in  the  Light  of  Republican  Insti- 
tutions. Bv  JOHN  S.  C.  ABBOTT.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  $5  00 ; 
Sheep,  85  5*0  ;  Half  Calf,  $7  25. 

ABBOTT'S  NAPOLEON  BONAPARTE.  The  History  of  Napoleon 
Bonaparte.  By  JOHN  S.  C.  ABBOTT.  With  Maps,  Illustrations,  and 
Portraits  on  Steel.  2  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $10  00;  Sheep,  $11  00;  Half 
Calf,  $14  50. 

ABBOTT'S  NAPOLEON  AT  ST.  HELENA.  Napoleon  at  St.  Hele- 
na :  or,  Interesting  Anecdotes  and  Remarkable  Conversations  of  the 
Emperor  during  the  Five  and  a  Half  Years  of  his  Captivity.  Collected 
.\p,m  the  Memorials  of  Las  Casas,  O'Meara,  Montholon,  Antommarchi, 
and  others.  By  JOHN  iS.  C.  ABBOTT.  Illustrated.  8vo,  Cloth,  ?5  00  ; 
Sheep,  $5  50;  Half  Calf,  >7  26. 


Valuable  and  Interesting  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries.    1 1 

-SCHAFF'S  CREEDS  OF  CHRISTENDOM.  Bibliotheca  Symbolica 
Ecclesiaj  Universalis.  The  Creeds  of  Christendom,  with  a  History  and 
Critical  Notes.  By  PHILIP  SCHAFF,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Professor  of  Bibli- 
cal Literature  in  the  Union  Theological  Seminary,  New  York.  3  vols. 
Vol.  I.  :  The  History  of  Creeds.  Vol.  II.  :  The  Greek  and  Latin 
Creeds,  with  Translations.  Vol.  III. :  The  Evangelical  Protestant 
Creeds,  with  Translations.  8vo,  Cloth,  $  15  00. 

YONGE'S  LIFE  OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE.  The  Life  of  Marie 
Antoinette,  Queen  of  France.  By  CHARLES  DUKE  YONGE,  Regius 
Professor  of  Modern  History  and  English  Literature  in  Queen's  Col- 
lege, Belfast.  With  Portrait.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 

POETS  OF  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  The  Poets  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century.  Selected  and  Edited  by  the  Rev.  ROBERT  ARIS 
WILLMOTT.  With  English  and  American  Additions,  arranged  by  EVERT 
A.  DUYCKINCK,  Editor  of  "  Cyclopaedia  of  American  Literature."  Com- 
prising Selections  from  the  Greatest  Authors  of  the  Age.  Superbly  Il- 
lustrated with  141  Engravings  from  Designs  by  the  most  Eminent  Art- 
ists. In  Elegant  small  4to  form,  printed  on  Superfine  Tinted  Paper, 
richly  bound  in  extra  Cloth,  Beveled,  Gilt  Edges,  $5  00 ;  Half  Calf, 
$5  50  ;  Full  Turkey  Morocco,  $9  00. 

COLERIDGE'S  COMPLETE  WORKS.  The  Complete  Works  of  Sam- 
uel Taylor  Coleridge.  With  an  Introductory  Essay  upon  his  Philosoph- 
ical and  Theological  Opinions.  Edited  by  the  Rev.  W.  G.  T.  SHEDD, 
D.D.  With  a  Portrait.  7  vols.,  12mo,  Cloth,  $10  50;  Half  Calf, 
$22  75. 

COLERIDGE'S  (SARA)  MEMOIR  AND  LETTERS.  Memoir  and  Let- 
ters of  Sara  Coleridge.  Edited  by  her  Daughter.  With  Two  Portraits 
on  Steel.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  $2  50;  Half  Calf,  $4  25. 

TYERMAN'S  WESLEY.  The  Life  and  Times  of  the  Rev.  John  Wes- 
ley, M.A.,  Founder  of  the  Methodists.  By  the  Rev.  LUKE  TYERMAN. 
With  Portraits.  3  vols.,  8vo,  Cloth,  $7  50;  Half  Calf,  $14  25. 

TYERMAN'S  OXFORD  METHODISTS.  The  Oxford  Methodists: 
Memoirs  of  the  Rev.  Messrs.  Clayton,  Ingham,  Gambold,  Hervey,  and 
Broughton,  with  Biographical  Notices  of  others.  By  the  Rev.  L.  TYER- 
MAN. With  Portraits.  Svo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 

VAMBfiRY'S  CENTRAL  ASIA.  Travels  in  Central  Asia.  Being 
the  Account  of  a  Journey  from  Teheran  across  the  Turkoman  Desert, 
on  the  Eastern  Shore  of  the  Caspian,  to  Khiva,  Bokhara,  and  Samar- 
cand,  performed  in  the  Year  18C3.  By  ARMINIDS  VAMBERY,  Member 
of  the  Hungarian  Academy  of  Pesth,  by  whom  he  was  sent  on  this  Sci- 
entific Mission.  With  Map  and  Illustrations.  Svo,  Cloth,  $4  50 ;  Half 
Calf,  $G  75. 

LYMAN  BEECIIER'S  AUTOBIOGRAPHY,  &c.  Autobiography, 
Correspondence,  &c.,  of  Lyman  Beecher,  D.D.  Edited  by  his  Son, 
CHARLES  BEECHKI:.  With  Three  Steel  Portraits,  and  Engravings  on 
Wood.  2  vols.,  12mo,  Clolh,  $5  00  ;  Half  Morocco,  $8  50. 


12     Valuable  and  Interesting  Works  for  Public  and  Private  Libraries. 

THE  DESERT  OF  THE  EXODUS.  Journeys  on  Foot  in  the  Wil- 
derness of  the  Forty  Years'  Wanderings ;  undertaken  in  connection 
with  the  Ordnance  Survey  of  Sinai  and  the  Palestine  Exploration  Fund. 
By  E.  II.  PALMER,  M.A.,  Lord  Almoner's  Professor  of  Arabic,  and 
Fellow  of  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge.  With  Maps  and  numerous 
Illustrations  from  Photographs  and  Drawings  taken  on  the  spot  by  the 
Sinai  Survey  Expedition  and  C.  F.  Tynvhitt  Drake.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth, 
$3  00. 

DRAKE'S  NOOKS  AND  CORNERS  OF  THE  NEW  ENGLAND 
COAST.  Nooks  and  Corners  of  the  New  England  Coast.  By  SAM- 
UEL ADAMS  DUAKE,  Author  of  "Old  Landmarks  of  Boston,"  "His- 
toric Fields  and  Mansions  of  Middlesex,"  &c.  Illustrated.  Svo,  Cloth, 
$350;  Half  Calf,  $5  75. 

BENJAMIN'S  CONTEMPORARY  ART.  Contemporary  Art  in  Eu- 
rope. By  S.  G.  W.  BENJAMIN.  Handsomely  Illustrated.  Svo,  Cloth, 
Gilt  Edges,  $3  50. 

TROWBRIDGE'S  POEMS.  The  Book  of  Gold,  and  Other  Poems. 
By  J.  T.  TROWBRIDGE.  Handsomely  Illustrated.  Svo,  Cloth,  Gilt 
Edges,  $2  50.  (In  a  box.) 

THOMSON'S  MALACCA,  INDO-CHINA,  AND  CHINA.  The  Straits 
of  Malacca,  Indo-China,  and  China ;  or,  Ten  Years'  Travels,  Advent- 
ures, and  Residence  Abroad.  By  J.  THOMSON,  F.R.G.S.  With  over 
GO  Illustrations  from  the  Author's  own  Photographs  and  Sketches.  Svo, 
Cloth,  $4  00. 

TREVELYAN'S  SELECTIONS  FROM  MACAULAY.  Selections 
from  the  Writings  of  Lord  Macaulny.  By  his  Nephew,  G.  OTTO  TREVEL- 
TAN,  M.P.  for  Hawick  District  of  Burghs.  Svo,  Cloth,  $2  50. 

OUR  CHILDREN'S  SONGS.  With  Illustrations.  Svo,  Ornamental 
Cover,  $1  50. 

PRIME'S  POTTERY  AND  PORCELAIN.  Pottery  and  Porcelain  of 
all  Times  and  Nations.  With  Tables  of  Factory  and  Artists'  Marks, 
for  the  Use  of  Collectors.  By  WILLIAM  C.  PRIME,  LL.D.  Illustrated. 
STO,  Ornamental  Cover,  Cloth,  $7  00.  (In  a  box.) 


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